The Congress leader had a chat with cobbler Ram Chait in Uttar Pradesh’s Sultanpur, who informed the Rae Bareli MP of his “financially weak” condition and sought his help.
“Leader of opposition Rahul Gandhi stopped the car on the way and met a family of cobbler.We are continuously fighting for the rights of these hardworking people, raising their voice from the streets to the Parliament. Our aim is to make their present safe and their future prosperous,” wrote Congress in a post on X.
Speaking to news agency ANI, Ram Chait said: “I told him I was financially weak and asked him for some help. I also showed him how I mend shoes.”
Earlier in the day, Rahul Gandhi appeared before the Sultanpur MP/MLA court in connection with a defamation case lodged against him for alleged objectionable remarks directed at Union home minister Amit Shah. The court on July 2 had asked Rahul Gandhi to appear on July 26.
Rahul Gandhi’s counsel Kashi Prasad Shukla told TOI that court recorded the statement of Rahul Gandhi and fixed next date of August 12 in the case for examination of evidence.
Shukla told TOI that Rahul Gandhi arrived at sharp 11 am and said that he was innocent the case was registered against him with a malafide intention.
BJP functionary Vijay Mishra had filed a complaint against Rahul Gandhi in Sultanpur for his remarks against Amit Shah during the Karnataka elections in 2018.
Gandhi had allegedly said that “BJP claims to believe in honest and clean politics but has a party president who is an accused in a murder case”.
At that time, Shah was the national president of BJP. Four years before Rahul’s remarks, a special CBI court in Mumbai had discharged Shah in a 2005 fake encounter case when he was the Gujarat home minister.