The Congress closed ranks behind former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Wednesday after a special CBI court issued summons to him to appear before it in a case of alleged irregularities in the allotment of coal blocks to Hindalco in Odisha while he was in office.

A senior party functionary told The Hindu: “We are backing Dr Manmohan Singh totally: we will fight the case legally.”

The party is taking the case very seriously: an emergency Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting has been called at Dr. Singh’s residence on Motilal Nehru Marg at 10 a.m. on Thursday, ahead of parliamentary proceedings for the day, to decide the legal strategy for the coal scam case as well as the position it will take on the Insurance Bill that is listed in the Rajya Sabha.

While senior BJP ministers, too, appeared embarrassed by the court order and distanced themselves from it, the Congress hit out at the Modi government, apparently holding it responsible for the turn of events: “..we.. condemn the BJP for its poor and desperate attempt to politicise an on-going judicial process,” Congress spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said at the party’s official briefing on Wednesday, stressing, “The government of the day wants to distract the attention of the people from the anti-farmer Land & Acquisition Bill which they have placed before the Parliament.”

The BJP is not just worried that the timing of the court order might have its fallout in Parliament. A senior Cabinet Minister, expressed concern that the court order — that has summoned Dr. Singh, former Coal Secretary P.C. Parakh and industrialist Kumar Mangalam Birla — could send out a “wrong message” to the bureaucracy and industry leading to the sort of paralysis in decision-making witnessed in the closing years of the Congress-led UPA government.

Of course, while even BJP ministers said they believed Dr. Singh was a man of integrity, some speculated on “how long he would remain silent” if the case takes a sharp turn.

Source: TH