Congress chief Rahul Gandhi on Friday claimed that Prime Minister Narendra Modi is perplexed as the BJP is heading for a defeat in Lok Sabha elections.
Maintaining that his party’s proposed minimum income guarantee scheme Nyuntam Aay Yojna (Nyay) will jump start the country's economy, Rahul Gandhi challenged PM Modi to have an open debate with him and claimed that in just 15 minutes he will expose how corrupt the PM is.
“But our PM even with his 56-inch chest is afraid to sit with me in a debate,” he said.
On the last day of campaigning for the sixth phase of Lok Sabha polls, Rahul addressed a rally here in support of Congress candidate former Union Minister Pawan Kumar Bansal, who is pitted against BJP’s outgoing MP Kirron Kher.
Continuing his tirade against the Prime Minister, the Congress chief accused him of failing to keep his 2014 pre-poll promises, including providing jobs to 2 crore youth, remunerative prices for farmers’ produce and Rs 15 lakh into the bank accounts of every citizen.
“PM Modi is flummoxed as he can gauge that BJP is heading for a defeat in the general elections. He says a lot of things about me, my father and my family in general. But I don’t mind,” he said.
Hard selling the Congress’ proposed ‘Nyay’ scheme which aims to provide Rs 72,000 to the poor annually, Rahul Gandhi claimed that it will jump start the derailed economy of the country.
He said that unlike BJP, the Congress don’t make false claims of crediting people’s bank accounts with unrealistic figures like Rs 15 Lakh. He assured through that under NYAY scheme, 25 crore families in India will be benefited, when the government puts Rs 72000 in accounts of women of the family annually.
He also claimed that the country's GDP fell by two per cent within one year of demonetisation.
In his about 25 minutes speech, Rahul Gandhi also hit out at Modi government’s flagship schemes Made in India and Startup India, alleging that unemployment in the country was at its 45-year high.
“I want to tell youth, especially those in Chandigarh, we have to compete with China. Not only Made in India, we've to print Made in Chandigarh behind cellphones,” he said.
The Congress chief said that he is startled that Chandigarh which was such a well-planned cities and had all the potential to become an international center doesn’t have its own fully-functional International Airport.
Talking further about Chandigarh, he said, “I learnt from Pawan Bansal that in Chandigarh many people still don’t have property ownership rights. I promise you that once we are elected to power, this shall be done for sure.”
As a dust storm hit the area where Gandhi was holding the rally, the Congress chief said, “This is the dress rehearsal for May 23 (the day poll results will be declared) as another storm will come that day wiping out the BJP."
Earlier, Rahul Gandhi’s speech was halted for few minutes owing to the breakdown in the sound system, which was due to the heavy winds and rainfall on Friday here.