Ahead of Budget, Congress targets Narendra Modi on economy

Ahead of the budget session of Parliament, Congress has trained its guns on Modi government's handling of the economy, rolling out financial experts to highlight the fiscal slowdown and its fallout.

A former professor of finance, Gourav Vallabh, hit out at the Modi government accusing it of increasing the country's debt by over 71% in the last five years, while per capita GDP grew by a 30%.

“We ask PM and FM, there is no increase in income, no employment, no new investment. How will we bear the burden of this increasing debt? Also, why should the people of India bear the burden of the failures of the BJP government? In Budget of 2020-21, please address this concern,” Vallabh, a Congress spokesperson, told reporters here.

Congress leader said in 2010, the national debt to GDP was 65%, which has increased to 69.7% in 2019 and is estimated to increase to 70.1% by March 2020.

On Monday, Congress had fielded economic journalist-turned-politician Supriya Shrinate to highlight the macro-economic situation.

“Even though the government may be in denial mode Indian economy is at the verge of slipping stagnation into stagflation,” Shrinate had said.

Amid a polarising and vitriolic campaign for the Delhi assembly elections, Congress is trying to shift the focus on economy and unemployment ahead of the Union Budget scheduled to be presented by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday.

Shrinate claimed that the only thing consistent about the Modi government was the deteriorating quality of budgets over six years.

“We sincerely hope the budget this year will have proposals that have been thought through and will not half-baked ones which will be rolled back one after another like last year. Investors like predictable policy environment. The budget needs to outline vision over medium to long term and not adopt the mask tape approach the government has consistently resorted to,” she said.