Bhiwani: With Congress interim president Sonia Gandhi’s scheduled to address an election rally in Mahendragarh Friday, senior leaders from the party’s Haryana unit have warned her against going ahead with the plan citing corruption charges against the candidate and his son.
The Mahendragarh rally will be Sonia’s first in the state that is going to polls on 21 October.
The party leaders have flagged the fact that Congress candidate from Mahendragarh assembly constituency, Dan Singh Rao, is an accused in a 2015 land scam. His son Akshat Singh, on the other hand, is an accused in a case related to the Rs 200-crore Adarsh Cooperative Society scam.
“The father is involved in a scam. The son is involved in another scam amounting to crores,” a senior Haryana Congress leader told ThePrint. “Party seniors in AICC (All India Congress Committee) felt that this should be brought to Sonia Gandhi’s attention,” said the leader, who did not wish to be named.
While Sonia is scheduled to hold her first rally in Mahendragarh, former Congress chief Rahul Gandhi held a public meeting in Marora of Nuh district earlier this week.
The party’s poll prospects appear to be dim in Haryana where it is fighting crippling factionalism and defections amid an onslaught from the ruling BJP.
“The mood in the state is already against the Congress, especially on issues of corruption. This (rally) can backfire on the party,” said a second Haryana Congress leader who didn’t wish to be named.
“The case was forgotten and not mentioned in the run-up to the election. He’s the only candidate from there and has been a two-time MLA so no one really questioned it,” said the first leader.
The decision on whether or not to cancel the rally is still pending with Sonia, the first leader added.
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Cases against Rao & his son
In 2015, Congress leader Dan Singh Rao was booked for duping a Chandigarh-based man of Rs 60 crore by selling him farmers’ land using forged documents, said a Times of India report.
The complainant had alleged that Rao and others used forged documents to sell him three plots in Gurgaon. Rao was chief parliamentary secretary then, and had the Department of Town and Planning under his command, the report added.
Rao’s son Akshat Singh, former Haryana Youth Congress vice-president, is also an accused in the case.
Singh is also accused of aiding Vivek Harivyasi, CEO of the Adarsh Group — which allegedly committed a fraud by siphoning off over Rs 200 crore — via his company. Harivyasi is one of the three main accused in the ponzi scheme case.
HNS Private Limited — of which Singh is a listed director — allegedly took Rs 4 crore in lieu of four flats in Gurgaon that were never transferred to Adarsh Group or even owned by the company, according to a bail application filed in August by one of the accused, Surender Singh. Surender owns one of the companies under investigation.
ThePrint has seen a copy of the bail application.
The first Congress leader quoted above said Akshat has been declared “absconding”.
ThePrint reached Rao for comments but there was no response until the time of publishing.
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