Targeting Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP-led Government at the Centre, AICC vice-president Rahul Gandhi on Saturday said that the present Government at the Centre is for the industrialists and rich people and not for the poor and working class people.
“Recently, Arun Jaitley Ji has brought a ‘Fair and lovely’ scheme. By this scheme the thieves can convert their black money into white and they do not have to pay tax for this. But the Government has put the tax burden on the salaried people, who work for their complete lives for salary and get pension after retirement,” said Gandhi while addressing a massive public rally at Borghat in Central Assam’s Nagaon district on Saturday.
“I told the Prime Minister to do something on this (removing the tax on PF). The Prime Minister gave a one hour speech in Parliament but mentioned nothing on this,” he said while adding that the Congress party will fight for the salaried people for their causes.
“I want to assure that salaried class that the Congress will fight for them, we are going to pressurise the Government at the Centre as this Government is not your Government, this is not the Government of farmers and employees but of only the industrialists,” he said.
“The present Government at the Centre is for a few industrialists and businessmen only. They (businessmen) get everything. Thousands of crores of Rupees have come to country’s exchequer after recent fall in the petrol prices. But the people of the country will not get even a single penny, all the money will go to his (Prime Minister’s) industrialist friends,” said Gandhi while adding that the current Government at the Centre is not the Government of common people.
Gandhi also slammed the BJP for the recent incident at JNU and said that while those who shouted anti-Indian slogans should be punished, the future of about 8,000 students of the JNU should not be spoiled. “There are about 8,000 students in JNU out of which 1,000 are from Northeast. The BJP has put the JNU SU president Kanaiah Kumar behind bars by filing sedition case against him. I have listened to his speech, the 20-minute speech and there was not a single word against the country. If some people have shouted anti-Indian slogans in JNU, you punish them. But why you are trying to spoil future of the 8,000 students. Why are you trying to spoil the careers of 1,000 students from NE in JNU. We are going to fight for them,” he said.