Congress announces nationwide protest against increase in prices

Priyanka Gandhi said the government has broken the back of the poor and middle class by increasing the price of domestic cooking gas

Asking whether the hike in price of domestic LPG cylinder will be the cost of toppling Maharashtra, the Congress has announced a nationwide protest against price rise with a focus on GST on essential goods and increase in domestic gas rates.

While Mahila Congress on Wednesday asked in a tweet hours after a Rs 50 rise in LPG prices was announced, "is this the cost of toppling the Maharashtra Government?", Congress spokesperson Ragini Nayak said the party workers will hold protests in districts across the country on Thursday.

Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra said the BJP spoke of welfare of the poor at its national executive meeting while imposing 5% "Gabbar Singh Tax (GST)" on flour, cereals, curd and paneer. She said the government has now broken the back of the poor and middle class by increasing the price of domestic cooking gas.

Vowing to hit the streets against the "Modi-made inflation", Nayak said Congress will put pressure on the Narendra Modi government to take back the hike in prices of petrol, diesel and LPG.

"We will have a nationwide protest on Thursday, and we will keep raising the issue inside and outside Parliament,” she said.

She said Modi had made price rise an issue during the 2014 Lok Sabha elections but under his rule, there has not been a single day when the common man has found any respite from back-breaking inflation.

"At the time when Manmohan Singh was Prime Minister, the Congress government used to buy oil at an expensive rate and sell it cheap to the public. But now, despite everything being cheap in the international market, it is being sold expensive to the public," she alleged.

Referring to an RTI response, she said 3.59 crore people were unable to afford an LPG cylinder, and 42% Ujjwala beneficiaries were forced to go back to use wood for cooking.

“A gas cylinder now costs Rs 1,053 in the national capital. In remote areas, it would cost around Rs 1,100, and even more in the black market. How many people can buy such an expensive gas cylinder? I want to tell the Prime Minister that to understand the pain of the people, one does not need a 56-inch chest but a beating heart,” she said.