 "Congress to highlight farmers', ex-servicemen woes at Parliament during Winter Session")
With an eye to corner the BJP-led centre, the Congress is planning to highlight farmers'issues along with ex-servicemen's problems with the One Rank One Pension (OROP) scheme during the upcoming winter session of the parliament that is scheduled to begin from November 16.
Congress sources said the government's mishandling of the suicide of Subedar Ramkishan Grewal and its general apathy towards the rural distress, has provided the right kind of fodder to the opposition party ahead of the parliament session.
A day after Rahul Gandhi courted arrest, protesting the harassment of Grehwal's kin by the police , he attended the former soldier's funeral at Bamla village in Haryana's Bhiwani district, thereby expressing solidarity with the family.
Earlier in the evening, Gandhi attended a candle march organised by the Youth Congress at Delhi's Jantar Mantar and was detained for a second time. Even as Rahul vowed to take up the cause of the army pensioners, former union minister P Chidambaram demanded that home minister Rajnath Singh should resign over the misbehaviour of police officials towards the grieving family.
"Home minister should remove the police commissioner. If he can't, he should tender his resignation," Chidambaram tweeted.
Rahul had, in a letter, recently urged Prime Minister Modi to implement the OROP meaningfully.
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Sources said Rahul's involvement with the issue clearly shows the importance he attaches to OROP and that the Congress party will not spare the government in the upcoming parliament session.
"The farmer's issue and OROP would certainly be our focus," said party whip and Rajya Sabha member Satyavrat Chaturvedi.
Congress communication chief Randeep Surjewala targeted Haryana's Chief Minister ML Khattar and Union Minister VK Singh, who has expressed doubts over the suicide.
While Khattar said martyrs die while fighting in the bordering areas and not by taking their own lives, Singh alleged that the deceased had contested local body polls on a Congress ticket.
"Panchayat elections are not fought on party tickets," Surjewala said.
He said the centre had panicked over the issue and had unleashed the might of the state's CM and the Union Minister against the voices being raised over OROP anomalies.
"Gen VK Singh's continuous character assassination of a soldier is disgusting. BJP encashs Army's bravery but fails to do justice to veterans," Surjewala tweeted.