Bharat Bandh call given to divert people’s attention from Herald case: BJP

NEW DELHI: The BJP Monday claimed that the ‘Bharat Bandh’ call given by the Congress was to divert the people’s attention from the hearing in the Delhi High Court on a matter related to the National Herald case involving its “corrupt” leaders.nnWelcoming the Delhi High Court’s order to dismiss pleas of Congress leaders Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi challenging the reopening of their tax assessments for 2011-12, the BJP’s national spokesperson, Sambit Patra, said it was a “victory of common man” and “exposes the real face of the Gandhi family”.nnAddressing the media at the party head office here, Patra said this was a big victory in the battle against corruption initiated by the Narendra Modi dispensation.nnThe income tax cases against the Congress leaders have arisen from the probe into a private criminal complaint filed by BJP leader Subramanian Swamy before a trial court in connection with the National Herald case.nn”The whole (Gandhi) family today is known as a family who cheats, a family who goes for tax evasion, a family of corrupts and a family who conspires against the law of the land, a family which includes Rahul Gandhi, Sonia Gandhi, Robert Vadra and Priyanaka Vadra,” Patra said.nnHe further claimed that the call for ‘Bharat Bandh’ by the Congress was also linked with this case as it was to divert the people’s attention from the National Herald matter.nnThey knew that they are going to lose the case in the Delhi High Court and that is the reason why today was the day they have given a call for the ‘Bharat Bandh’, Patra said.nn”The people whose conscience was locked somewhere, those who were thick involved in corruption, the same people had deliberately called for the Bharat Bandh because they knew the National Herald case was on and the verdict was expected today,” Patra told reporters.nnAttacking the entire Gandhi family, the BJP leader said it exposes the reality of them who have been cheating the country for years, and added, “they had a sense of entitlement that throne of India belongs to a particular family”.nnHe also took on former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and said it appears that even he was complicit in the case.nnIn the complaint in the National Herald case, Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi and others have been accused of conspiring to cheat and misappropriate funds by paying just Rs 50 lakh, through which the Young India (YI) had obtained the right to recover Rs 90.25 crore that the Associated Journals Ltd (AJL) owed to the Congress party.