Congress President Rahul Gandhi tore into the government led by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) at the Centre for ignoring the plight of farmers and youth. In a dramatic speech in the Lok Sabha, Gandhi also accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of leading a government that favours the rich and ignores the poor.
In his fiesty speech during the no-confidence motion in Lok Sabha, Gandhi levelled allegations against the government accusing it of shielding bank defaulters such as Nirav Modi and Vijay Mallya and lying about the Dassault Rafale deal.
The 48-year-old Congress chief said that the Modi government is capable of delivering “jumla strikes”.
“The symptoms of this strike are that the target initially feels a great sense of happiness and excitement which then turns into a feeling of shock and eventually into eight hour long speeches,” said Gandhi.
“People in Surat said that the PM has hit us the hardest (with demonetisation). Unemployment in the country is highest in the last seven years. The GST was introduced by the Congress; you protested as Gujarat CM. We wanted one GST, including petrol and diesel. But the five different GST rates have destroyed the lives of people,” said Gandhi.
The Congress chief said that while the PM travels outside the country he has no time for his own people.
Gandhi said that PM Modi was afraid of looking him in the eye because “he has not been truthful”.
“The PM says that he is the Chowkidaar of the country but he becomes silent when Amit Shah’s son Jay Shah raises his income 16,000 times,” said Gandhi in Parliament.
Slamming the PM for appearing in the ad of Reliance Jio, Gandhi said that Modi “works only for the few rich businessmen, who are in collusion with him, and not for the country’s poor”.
Gandhi accused Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman of lying to the nation by reneging on her assurance that she will reveal the details of the Rafale fighter jet deal, citing a secrecy pact between India and France.
“I met the French President [Emmanuel Macron] and he told me that there was no secrecy pact between the two countries,” said Gandhi amid an uproar in the lower house.
Gandhi claimed that the deal for the fighter aircraft was fixed at Rs 52 crore during the UPA regime which “magically” escalated to Rs 1,650 crore in the current regime.
“A businessman who has not built a single airplane in his life and has a debt of Rs 35, 000 crore was given the Rafale deal because of his relationship with PM,” alleged Gandhi as BJP leaders rose up in protest.
He also criticised the Prime Minister for not taking up the Doklam issue during the ‘informal summit’ meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Wuhan earlier this year.
Accusing PM Modi of not creating jobs as promised before the 2014 elections, Gandhi said, “China gives 50,000 youth jobs in 24 hours whereas you [the Centre] give 400 jobs in the same time.”
“Kabhi kehte hai pakode banao, dukan kholo [He tells the youth to sell snacks or open shops],” said Gandhi slamming the government.
Gandhi accused the government of ignoring the tribals, Dalits and the women. He said that even though the farmers are crying for farm loan waiver, the Finance Ministry is not listening.
He said the Modi government has failed to protect women, pointing to a Thomson Reuters 2018 survey which placed India as the most dangerous country for women.