Lockdown not an attack on Covid-19, but on poor: Rahul Gandhi

Former Congress President Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday hit out at Prime Minister Narendra Modi, accusing him of “misleading” the country over the fight against Covid-19 and destroying the unorganised sector by forcing an unplanned lockdown.

The unplanned coronavirus lockdown, imposed without prior notice, was the “third attack” on the unorganised sector, he said in the fourth short video on the state of the economy, particularly the informal sector.

In the earlier videos, Rahul had listed out “demonetisation” and “faulty implementation of the GST” as the other reasons that hit the unorganised sector hard during the regime of Modi government.

“The poor, those in small and medium businesses, are daily wage earners. They eat with what they earn each day. When you announced a lockdown without notice, you attacked them. The Prime Minister said the fight will be for 21 days, the backbone of the unorganized sector broke in 21 days,” Rahul said.

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The former Congress president said that his party had suggested a package for small and medium businesses. “Instead, the government waived off taxes worth lakhs of crores of the richest fifteen-twenty people,” he said.

“The lockdown was not an attack on the coronavirus. The lockdown was an attack on the poor of India. The lockdown was an attack on labourers, farmers and small shopkeepers. It was an attack on our unorganised sector," Rahul said.

Earlier, he had released short videos on the Chinese transgressions in Ladakh. The videos are part of efforts of the Congress to present Rahul as the only challenger to Modi amid the growing demands for his return as the party president.

Rahul had stepped down as Congress president in July last year, after losing the second consecutive Lok Sabha elections to Modi-led BJP.