Finally, after a long silence, Dr Manmohan Singh has voiced out about the economic drop. While attending an interaction with people in business, professionals and the media in Mumbai’s Churchgate on Thursday, he blamed the Centre of failing to adopt people-oriented policies. He slashed Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and said that its apathy was evident in her statements.
Nirmala Sitharaman on Tuesday, at an event in the US, in which she stated that Manmohan Singh-Raghuram Rajan combination is responsible for subjecting public sector banks to their “worst phase”.
During the interaction, Dr Singh retaliated to FM’s comment and said BJP government have been reluctant to adopt people-oriented policies which are quite apparent in the statements of Nirmala Sitharaman. He advised that before one can fix the economy, one needs a proper analysis of the problem.
He added that the government has restored in blaming the opposition as it was incapable of finding solutions.
Emphasizing the decline of Maharashtra’s manufacturing sector over the past four quarters, he stated that there is lack of enough opportunity in the city, which is otherwise very lively.
Furthermore, he added that every third youth is jobless in the state. Moreover, migration from rural areas will only distress the situation of unemployment. He continued and said that Maharashtra used to be Number 1 in drawing investment; now is number 1 in farmer suicides.
Underlining the fact about BJP government not able to tackle the situation Dr Singh said industries need to be encouraged to grow. Unless industries are supported, there won’t be much change in the current economic condition of India as well as unemployment.
Dr Sing commented that “Slowdown, government apathy affecting aspirations, future of Indians. Business sentiments across Maharashtra are down, as many units have faced closure.”
About 15 delegates of PMC Bank depositors also met Dr Singh during the interaction. While commenting about the PMC fraud case, he stated that “Hope this issue (PMC Bank crisis) figures prominently in the Winter session of Parliament next month. RBI is a great national institution. Do hope and trust it applies its mind to find credible solutions… PM, govt of Maharashtra and FM should also apply their mind to find a solution.”
The notable side is that he had maintained his silence till now and decided to speak up when the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly election is nearing. Was this to gain the vote bank of people? If you look economy has been dropping since a while by now, but he never spoke about it. Nevertheless, to mention that even Congress was not much vocal about the same. Were they waiting for an election to come up?
We will have to wait and watch what the impact of his statement will be on the upcoming election.
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