New Delhi, Jan 30: The Congress party launched a scathing attack on the Modi government ahead of the budget session of Parliament, saying government’s demonetisation move is a major blunder. While tabling The Real State of Economy report a day before the Economic Survey will be released, the party said the Central government was hiding behind GDP growth rate numbers.
The report was tabled by former prime minister Manmohan Singh. Former finance minister P. Chidambaram was also present in the press conference. He said that the government was trying to hide behind a GDP number which is being challenged.
” The BJP is hiding behind a GDP number which is being challenged. People aren’t dazzled by it. But they are asking where are the jobs?” he said.
“Where are the jobs?Where is the new capital investment? Where is credit growth?
“There are no jobs, capital formation is declining, credit growth is the lowest in several decades,” he added.
Ahead of the tabling of the Economic Survey of 2017, Chidambaram said that the government would paint a rosy picture of the economy which must be questioned.
“Yet if the government presents tomorrow a rosy picture of the economy, people of India are entitled to question that,” said the Congress leader.
Chidambaram informed that the report was based on through research and analysis of prominent economic bodies as well as economists. He said the BJP government will present an exaggerated version of the economy and that the Congress’s report was closer to the reality.
Congress spokesperson Rajeev Gowda, who was also present, said demonetisation when the global economic slowdown was a monumental blunder.
“Demonetisation was a monumental blunder and it will slow down the economy by 2 percent,” he said.
He said even an independent economic agency like the International Monetary Fund pegged slowdown to be at least 1 percent.
Meanwhile, Dr Manmohan Singh refuted the allegations of the BJP that he facilitated loans to Vijay Mallya’s beleaguered company Kingfisher Airlines. He said he had done nothing that was in contravention of the law of the land. He said it was a routine affair to receive representations from captains of industries. He said normally he would pass the representations to relevant authorities and that was what he did.
“What I did was with full satisfaction of mine that we were not doing anything against law of the land,” said Dr Singh.
Chidambaram seconded the leader. He said ministries received hundreds of representations daily and it was impossible for ministers to read them and hence were forwarded to officers.