Congress High Command stand by Manmohan Singh in Coalgate

March 12,2015 (Agencies) In a striking show of solidarity a day after former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was summoned by a court in a coal scam case, Congress president Sonia Gandhi and over 100 party leaders today walked in a large group to the former Prime Minister's residence."We have no doubt whatsoever that he will be vindicated,"  Mrs Gandhi, expressing outrage, told reporters outside Dr Singh's home adding that  Manmohanji  is known not just in India but throughout the world as a person of integrity and probity. Congress leaders gathered at the party headquarters next to Sonia Gandhi's residence before walking briskly to Manmohan Singh's home about half a kilometre away.The former prime minister and his wife Gursharan Kaur were seen greeting the contingent with a smile. "I  am more than pleased and we will fight this case to the best of our ability," Dr Singh said later



and that he was "grateful that top leaders came to meet me."The Congress president has missed the last few days of Parliament because of viral fever and her silence was noticed on Wednesday, after a special CBI court summoned Manmohan Singh as an accused in a case linked to the illegal allocation of coal mining rights. Mrs Gandhi wanted to send out a loud and clear message in support of the 82-year-old who was prime minister for 10 years at the head of two successive Congress-led governments.Dr Singh is being investigated in a case that involves the allocation of a coal field in Odisha's Talabira block in 2005 to Hindalco, owned by industrialist Kumar Mangalam Birla. At the time, Dr Singh held direct charge of the Coal Ministry.Many BJP leaders commented that Manmohan Singh, a noted economist credited with starting India's reforms process in the 1990s, was paying the price of his party's wrong-doings