'Bajaj's remarks have made industrialists speak up'

Reacting to industrialist Rahul Bajaj's comments on the central government, Rajasthan chief minister Ashok Gehlot on Tuesday said his "bold" remarks have made other people and industrialists in the country speak up.

"After Bajaj's bold comments, people in Parliament spoke openly yesterday. Industrialists are also speaking now. Otherwise, they were tight-lipped," he told reporters here.

Gehlot said now that former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Bajaj have spoken about deficiencies in the government's policies, he hoped that big industrialists have got the courage to speak up. "Small or big, all industrialists were suffering but no one dared to speak," he said.

The chief minister said that the former prime minister has explained how the country was in economic crisis today.

"People did not understand and were not accepting this. I believe that (after the comments) people would understand and efforts would be made to restore the economy," he said.

He said Bajaj's comment would wake the government which would also see which direction the country was heading in.

Bajaj, the chairman of Bajaj group, had openly told Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Home Minister Amit Shah and Railway Minister Piyush Goyal at a programme in Mumbai on Saturday that people were afraid of criticising the BJP government's policies and that no one in the business community would speak about economic issues.