Mumbai, Oct 26 (IANS): Thousands of Congress activists on Friday staged a noisy protest outside the CBI office in Bandra Kurla Complex (BKC) here, shouting anti-government slogans following the move to strip CBI Director Alok Verma of his powers.

Led by party chief Sanjay Nirupam, senior leaders including several former Ministers and ex-MPs like Eknath Gaikwad and Priya Dutt and thousands of workers joined the demonstrations carrying placards and banners with anti-BJP slogans.

Slogans of "Modi se CBI Bachao", "Chehre pe jo laali hai, Rafale ki dalali hai" and "Chor hai, Chor hai, Narendra Modi Chor hai" rent the air outside the CBI city headquarters.

"We are opposing Prime Minister Narendra Modi's disgraceful and unconstitutional attempt to block the investigations into the Rafale scam by removing the CBI Director Alok Verma," Nirupam said.

Nirupam said that the Modi government had not spared a single institution and undermined the integrity of all critical organisations including the CBI.

Besides Mumbai, the Maharashtra Congress also organised similar demonstrations in Pune and Nagpur outside the CBI offices there as part of nationwide protests.