Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi alleged on Friday that an Enforcement Directorate raid is being planned against him for invoking the “chakravyuh” metaphor in his Lok Sabha speech on the Union Budget.

The chakravyuh is a military formation depicted in the Hindu epic Mahabharata, in which soldiers arrange themselves into a maze of seven defensive walls resembling a disc (chakra) or blooming lotus when viewed from above.

“Apparently, 2 in 1 didn’t like my chakravyuh speech,” Gandhi said in a post on X, in an apparent reference to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and home minister Amit Shah. “ED [Enforcement Directorate] ‘insiders’ tell me a raid is being planned. Waiting with open arms…Chai and biscuits on me.”

The Congress MP had said in the Lok Sabha on Monday that a modern, 21st-century version of the chakravyuh was being used to attack India, the Hindustan Times reported.

“It is in the form of a lotus and the prime minister wears the symbol on his chest,” the Rae Bareli MP said, referring to the logo of the Bharatiya Janata Party. “What was done with Abhimanyu is being done with India, with its youth, women, farmers and small and medium businesses.”

Abhimanyu is a character in the Mahabharata who is dishonourably killed in battle by six opponents.

According to Gandhi, there are six persons at the centre of India’s modern, metaphorical chakravyuh, including Modi, Shah, industrialists Gautam Adani and Mukesh Ambani, National Security Advisor Ajit Doval and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief Mohan Bhagwat.

Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla tried to dissuade the Congress leader from naming those other than Modi and Shah since they are not members of the House.

Gandhi claimed that the political executive, central agencies and monopoly capital that allowed two persons to own the entirety of the country’s wealth were at the heart of the chakravyuh.

“You created a chakravyuh of unemployment and paper leak,” Gandhi said, according to the Hindustan Times. “You call yourself nationalists but when you have to help jawans, you do not give money for pensions. You trapped the youth in the chakravyuh of Agniveer.”

The National Eligibility-Cum-Entrance Test and other public sector entrance examinations in the country have come under the scanner in recent months over allegations of paper leaks and other irregularities.

Agniveers are persons who are recruited into the armed forces under the Agnipath short-term recruitment scheme. Under the scheme, citizens aged between 17-and-a-half to 21 years are eligible to apply for a four-year term in the military.

The introduction of the scheme triggered protests across several states as aspirants demanded permanent recruitment with pension benefits. Agniveers are not entitled to pension and other benefits upon their completion of service.

Later on Monday, Gandhi, in a post on X, said, “Today a 21st century lotus-shaped chakravyuh is trapping India and is controlled by six figures: Narendra Modi, Amit Shah, Adani, Ambani, Ajit Doval and Mohan Bhagwat.”

Opposition parties have repeatedly alleged that central agencies have been weaponised to arm-twist them into joining the BJP or the National Democratic Alliance.

In March last year, 14 Opposition parties moved the Supreme Court alleging that the Centre is misusing agencies such as the Central Bureau of Investigation and the Enforcement Directorate.

The Congress, the Dravida Munnetra Kazahgam, the Trinamool Congress and the Rashtriya Janata Dal were among the parties that approached the Supreme Court. They had urged the court to frame pre-arrest guidelines to prevent misuse of investigative agencies.

The Enforcement Directorate had also arrested Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren in the run-up to the 2024 Lok Sabha election.

In April, Modi said that the efficiency of the Enforcement Directorate had increased after the BJP came to power at the Centre in 2014.

The claim was made days after an analysis showed that the central agency had registered 5,155 cases under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act in the last ten years, as compared to just 1,797 cases filed in the previous decade. However, it secured conviction orders only in 36 cases, leading to the prosecution of 63 persons.

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