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Sonia Gandhi will appear before the Enforcement Directorate (ED) officials for the second round of questioning on 26 July in an alleged money laundering probe linked to the National Herald newspaper.
Earlier, ED had issued summons on 25 July but it had deferred by a day to July 26, officials told PTI . The reason for the change of date could not be ascertained immediately.
Gandhi was earlier question by ED on 21 July for nearly two hours. Sonia Gandhi's daughter and party leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra accompanied her to the ED office.
Congress leaders had protested in different parts of the country over ED summons to the party's interim chief. Several Congress MPs including Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge and several workers were detained by the Delhi Police for demonstrations against the questioning of the party chief.
Senior Congress leaders including P Chidambaram, Ajay Maken, Manickam Tagore, KC Venugopal, Adhir Ranjan Chaudhry, Shashi Tharoor, Sachin Pilot, and Harish Rawat. Ashok Gehlot, K Suresh were among those detained.
They were later released. Congress workers in Nagpur were also detained in the wake of the protest. The protest by the Congress turned violent in Bengaluru as the Youth Congress workers allegedly set a car on fire, in front of ED office.
For the questioning to be held on 26 July, the Congress president in the Karnataka, D K Shivakumar said that 'Mauna Satyagraha' will be organised from the time Sonia Gandhi enters the ED office in New Delhi, till the time she comes out. In Rajasthan, a ‘satyagrah' will be held on Tuesday at Shaheed Memorial to protest against the questioning by the ED.
The 75-year-old Congress leader, who was supposed to appear for questioning before the agency last month, requested for delaying the investigations owing to the fact the doctors had "strictly advised her to rest at home following her hospitalisation on account of covid-19 and lung infection". Following this, she was issued fresh summons to join the ED investigation in July.
In June, senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi was questioned by the ED 54 hours in five days in the National Herald case.
The federal agency recently registered a fresh case under the criminal provisions of the PMLA after a trial court took cognisance of an Income Tax department probe against Young Indian. Following which, ED decided to summon Gandhis for questioning.