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8 years of Modi government marked by 8 deceits, says Congress

High inflation, unemployment, misgovernance and communal polarisation have been hallmarks of the eight years of the Narendra Modi government, the Congress said on Thursday as the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government completed three years of its second term.

The Congress released a 20-page Hindi booklet titled ‘8 saal, 8 chall Sarkar Viphal,’ [’Eight years, eight deceits and a failed government’] to highlight the Modi government’s failures with regard to economy, employment, inflation, farmers’ income, national security, welfare for the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Classes.

Addressing a joint press conference here, party general secretaries Ajay Maken and Randeep Surjewala claimed that the BJP government had created a record of “hoodwinking the people with fake jumlas and slogans during its eight years of rule”.

The BJP’s promise of “achche din” or good days was meant only for themselves or a select group of crony capitalists and industrialists whose wealth had increased manifold, the Congress said.

Accusing the BJP of spreading hatred in society through communal polarisation, Maken said that 10,000 cases of communal clashes had taken place during the last eight years of the Modi government.

He also accused the BJP of seeking votes in the name of the brave soldiers and charged that the ruling party’s ‘disastrous policies” led to the economy’s free fall.

“...All these eight things, which we have picked up, concern each and every citizen of the country. Be it failure to protect our boundaries, be it rising inflation, unemployment, all these failures are bigger than the other. So, we can’t pick one failure over the other,” Maken responded, when asked to pick the single biggest failure.

Surjewala said the eight years of the BJP rule had seen continuous threats to the sovereignty and security of the country, with China transgressing our borders and the Prime Minister keeping silent about it.

“What happened to the Prime Minister’s 56 inch chest and laal ankh [red eyes],” Surjewala asked, referring to a statement of Modi before the 2014 elections that a leader needed to have a 56-inch chest to take on China.

He said that 84% Indians had seen reduced incomes and 12 crore people lost their jobs, 60 lakh Micro Small Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) shut shop and unemployment figures touched a 45-year high. In contrast, Surjewala claimed that two-three industrialists had seen their incomes rise by ₹1,000 crore every day and 142 super rich made gains of ₹30 lakh crore in the last one year during COVID-19.

“While high prices are upsetting the budgets of common people on the one hand, on the other communal fires are flaring and the BJP is trying to benefit politically from it,” the Congress leader said.
Imran Khan gives six-day ultimatum to Pakistan government to announce fresh polls

Ousted Prime Minister of Pakistan Imran Khan on Thursday gave a six-day deadline to the Shehbaz Sharif government for dissolving provincial assemblies and announcing fresh general elections, warning that if the “imported government” failed to do so, he would return to the capital with the “entire nation”.

Addressing a rally of thousands of protesters of the ‘Azadi March’ at Jinnah Avenue in Islamabad on Thursday morning, Khan lashed out at the government for using “tactics” such as raids and arrests to stop his party’s march, even as he thanked the Supreme Court (SC) for taking notice of the matter.

“Government has tried every method to crush our Azadi March, they used teargas on peaceful protest, our homes were raided and privacy of the homes was violated, however, I have seen the nation free itself of fear of slavery,” he said.

“My message for the imported government is to dissolve assemblies and announce elections, otherwise, I will come back again to Islamabad after six days,” he was quoted as saying by the Geo News.

Noting that there was a “huge responsibility” on the Supreme Court judges, Khan asked where in a democracy peaceful protests were not allowed and demonstrators had to face tear-gas shelling, police raids and arrests.

“I had decided that I will sit here until the government dissolves assemblies and announces elections, but of what I have seen in the past 24 hours, they [government] are taking the nation towards anarchy,” he said, claiming that the government was also trying to create a divide between the nation and police.

Khan said the government would be happy if he staged a sit-in in Islamabad as it would lead to clashes between the people and police and the army, the Dawn newspaper reported.