Congress slams detention of its leaders by Delhi Police as ‘undemocratic, unfortunate and highhanded’

The Congress on Thursday slammed the detention and arrest of senior Congress leaders including Working Committee Members and MPs by the Delhi Police while they were proceeding to meet President Ram Nath Kovind as “undemocratic, unfortunate and highhanded”.

In a statement, AICC general secretary KC Venugopal said, “Even as the leaders gathered peacefully barring the three leaders, who would have proceeded to Rashtrapati Bhawan, all senior leaders and party functionaries were detained and taken in police custody.”

He quoted former Congress president Rahul Gandhi as telling the media that, “I want to tell the PM that these farmers are not going to go back home until these farm laws are repealed. Opposition parties stand with farmers and labourers".

Here is the full text of the statement:

In the most undemocratic, unfortunate, highhanded and brazen manner today the Delhi Police under the instruction of Home Minister Shri Amit

Shah and the PM Shri Narendra Modi, detained and arrested senior Congress leaders including Working Committee Members and MPs.

This happened when the delegation led by Shri Rahul Gandhi and leaders of the party in Rajya Sabha & Lok Sabha was to meet Hon’ble President of India and handover around 2 crore signatures from farmers, farm labourers and manual labourers urging the intervention of the President to ensure the repeal of the anti-farmer, anti-people laws.

Even as the leaders gathered peacefully barring the three leaders, who would have proceeded to Rashtrapati Bhawan, all senior leaders and party functionaries were detained and taken in police custody.

The three-member delegation led by Shri Rahul Gandhi, submitted the memorandum with around two crore signatures to Hon’ble President demanding his urgent intervention.

Shri Rahul Gandhi later speaking to the media said, “I want to tell the PM that these farmers are not going to go back home until these farm laws are repealed. Opposition parties stand with farmers and labourers".

Reacting on arrest and detention of Congress leaders Shri Gandhi slammed Modi Government saying, “It is an assault on the idea of India. The government is stopping our MPs from moving out of our office... There is no democracy in India, it is only in imagination, not in reality”.

Shri Rahul Gandhi insisted on convening a joint session of parliament and repealing the anti-farmer legislations.

Those arrested and detained included, Smt. Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, Shri K.C. Venugopal, Shri Anand Sharma, Shri Ajay Maken, Shri Kodikunnil Suresh, Shri Jairam Ramesh, Kumari Selja, Shri Randeep Singh Surjewala, Shri H.K. Patil, Shri Pawan Kumar Bansal, Shri Vivek Bansal, Shri Rajeev Satav, Shri Kuljit Singh Nagra, Dr. Chella Kumar, Shri Bhakta Charan Das, Shri Devender Yadav, Shri Manish Chatrath,

Shri Deepender Singh Hooda, Shri Kuldeep Bishnoi, Shri. Sunil Jakhar, Shri Govind Singh Dotasara, Shri N. Uttam Kumar Reddy, Shri T.N. Prathapan, Shri Hibi Eden, Shri Raj Mohan Unnithan, Shri Syed Nasir Hussain, Shri Pradeep Tamta, Shri Jasbir Singh Gill, Shri Santoksh Choudhary, Dr. Amar Singh, Smt. Preneet Kaur, Dr. K. Jayakumar, Ms. Selvi Jothi Mani, Ms Sushmita Dev, Shri Anil Chowdhury, Shri Srinivas B.V., Shri Neeraj Kundan and many others.

They all were later released.