Today in Politics: Hit by Rs 1,823 cr I-T notices, Cong set to hold nationwide protests against ‘tax terrorism’

“An illegal attempt to freeze the bank accounts of the principal national Opposition party the Indian National Congress in February has gone on for over a month on the eve of the national general election. Yesterday, we received fresh notices from the I-T Department to pay Rs 1,823.08 crores. Already the I-T Department has forcibly taken away Rs 135 crores from our bank account,” the AICC general secretary (organisation) said in a letter to all state party chiefs and other top leaders across the country.

Venugopal said that eight years of income tax returns of the Congress have been reopened on “baseless, manufactured grounds” and called the action a “blatant attack” on democracy.

The new I-T notices were issued to the Congress at a time when the parties are getting their campaigns underway.

Hitting back, the Congress also alleged that the BJP was in “serious violation” of income-tax laws for which tax authorities should raise a demand of more than Rs 4,600 crore from the ruling party. However, a BJP spokesperson on Friday claimed the Congress had “failed to follow the correct procedures for filing taxes or making appeals.”

Cong’s South push

In the South, the Congress is set to get a boost in Telangana as Keshava Rao, top Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) leader, is set to jump ship with his daughter G Vijayalakshmi, the Hyderabad mayor, likely to follow suit, as reported by Sreenivas Janyala. Rao is expected to join the Congress on Saturday.

The 84-year-old former Congress leader Rao, who joined the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (now renamed BRS) in 2013 ahead of the bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh to create Telangana state, had been close to BRS chief K Chandrashekar Rao. He was KCR’s troubleshooter and adviser and remained a close confidant until the party lost power last December.

In neighbouring Andhra Pradesh, the state Congress chief Y S Sharmila is set to launch the party’s Lok Sabha and Assembly poll campaign on Saturday. She is expected to announce a mass voter outreach effort and the party’s flagship programmes aimed at farmers, youth and weaker sections.

Sharmila’s campaign comes amid the ongoing ‘Memanta Siddham (we are all ready)’ election bus tour being undertaken by her brother, YSRCP supremo and CM Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy. Last Wednesday, Jagan had embarked on a 21-day tour – during which he has reiterated his target to win all 175 Assembly and 25 Lok Sabha seats – from Idupulupaya in Kadapa district to Icchapuram in Srikakulam district. The state is scheduled to vote on May 13.

Adityanath’s campaign

Ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s rally in Meerut on Sunday to launch the BJP’s Lok Sabha campaign from Uttar Pradesh, CM Yogi Adityanath on Wednesday began a tour of 15 districts to prepare the electoral ground for the party’s target to come to power for a third consecutive term.

According to the programme released by the BJP, Adityanath is covering 15 districts in five days from March 27 to 31, during which he will hold meetings with intellectuals to present an account of the work done by the government in the run-up to the polls. The CM’s events began from western UP, where elections are also going to be held in the first few phases.

On Saturday, the CM is likely to attend meetings with the intellectuals in Baghpat and Bulandshahr.

— With PTI inputs