Modi's $5 trillion economy a pipe dream: Manmohan

Former prime minister Manmohan Singh on Thursday said that an all-round atmosphere of gloom and doom was prevailing in the country on account of the economic slowdown.

He hit out at the Modi government for failing to incentivise the economy.

The 86-year-old economist-turned-prime minister donned the politician's hat and urged Congress leaders to spread the message far and wide that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had ignored the promises he had made to them during the elections.

“The prime minister is talking of a five-trillion-dollar economy, but it all looks like a pipe-dream,” Singh said underlining that the economy is required to grow at 12% to reach that target.

He said that it was the duty of the Congress workers to take this message to the country that what Modi had promised during the Lok Sabha elections was not being delivered

The Congress now plans to educate its leaders on the economic slowdown by organising conventions in all states between September 20 and 30 and then hit the streets next month through a series of agitations.

Singh, who served as prime minister from 2004-14, said that farm growth had shrunk to 2.7% and manufacturing sector had registered a growth of 0.6% and if this situation was not reversed, “the worst could happen on the employment situation”.

“The manufacturing industries are being affected for want of demand, for want of investment incentives and the result is that there is an all-round atmosphere of gloom and doom,” he said.

The former prime minister said that what was more dangerous was that the Modi government was complacent enough not to realise that the country was in the midst of a protracted economic slowdown.

“One could hope that the BJP government would come up with a package to stimulate demand, to promote investment. But you talk to anybody in the industry and the general feeling there is tax terrorism in place of incentivising investment and that is the reason why private sector investment have gone sluggish,” Singh said.