New Delhi: Cornered in the ongoing second half of the budget session over allegations of corruption, the Congress will organize a protest march to symbolically “gherao" the Parliament on 6 May. Congress party president Sonia Gandhi will lead the protest, which will highlight the issue of “toppling elected governments" of Uttarakhand and Arunachal Pradesh.

The timing of the protest is crucial given that the Congress party, including Gandhi, has been under fire over charges by the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) that Congress leaders benefited from a deal with Anglo-Italian helicopter maker AgustaWestland, a deal that was scrapped after allegations of bribery surfaced in Italy.

The protest outside Parliament will be the culmination of the party’s Save Democracy march, in which Congress will highlight the campaign of “deceit and deliberate lies" by the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Congress’ chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said on Saturday, in a slant reference to the AugustaWestland case.

“The idea (for the protest march) had come up immediately after the Uttarakhand development but the recent campaign by the government against the Congress party is also one of the reasons. We are organizing the protest basically to show that we are taking our case to the public. The march will begin from Jantar Mantar where all our senior leaders will be present and we will go on to gherao the Parliament,’’ a senior Congress leader said, requesting anonymity.

The protest march will also draw attention to the drought, agrarian crisis and the spate of suicides by farmers. Congress state units from Delhi’s neighbours including Haryana, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh will also attend the protest.

Ever since it was voted out of power in the 2014 general elections, the top brass of the Congress party led by Gandhi has held street agitations on several issues. The most prominent one was a rally against the land acquisition legislation in April last year at New Delhi’s historical Ramlila Grounds. Gandhi had earlier also led a march of opposition parties to Rashtrapati Bhawan on the same issue.

In March last year, Gandhi had led a “solidarity march" from party headquarters to the residence of former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, a day after a special court summoned him over irregularities in coal mine allocations.

‘’Beyond doubt, this protest march has been triggered because of the Congress being cornered over the AugustaWestland case. But what else can the Congress party do? It has to keep portraying itself as a pro-people party which takes issues to the public. What is important is Sonia Gandhi’s presence means the Congress is taking this political fight to its highest level,’’ Manisha Priyam, a New Delhi-based political analyst said.

“For the BJP, how does it politically attack a party like the Congress, which is held together by the Gandhi family? The only way is to attack the Gandhis, which for the BJP, the AugustaWestland case has brought in Gandhi directly.’’ she added.

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