Ahmedabad | Senior BJP leader Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday urged people to assess the Congress’ five years in the opposition, claiming it was creating chaos to stop the government from doing good work.
She said the amount of 72,000 per year, promised by the Congress to the poor under its NYAY scheme, was half of what the Narendra Modi government is giving away currently to poor citizens through direct subsidy transfers.
While addressing professionals and intellectuals of the city here as part of BJP’s Lok Sabha campaign, she said though PM Modi was ready to reply to the Congress’ questions in Parliament, leaders in the opposition created chaos and did not allow him to do so.
“Before 2014, the BJP was in opposition and it campaigned to uproot a corrupt government. Now, we are in power while the Congress is in opposition. You should compare our performance as an opposition and that of the Congress,” she said.
“As an opposition party, we used to raise questions in the Parliament. But, we never made any baseless allegations.
Now, though Modi ji was ready to give answers, he was not allowed by the opposition leaders who created chaos in the Parliament. This is today’s opposition. They are trying to stop us from doing good work,” she claimed.
“This is what the opposition has become. You have to think about this too,” Sitharaman told the gathering.
On the minimum income guarantee scheme promised by the Congress, Sitharaman said “The Rs 72,000, which Congress is promising to give, is less than what Modiji is giving right now to the needy citizens through direct subsidy transfers.”
She said because of the efforts of Modi, no country had criticised India for its February 26 Balakot air strike.
“Pakistan is already in the grey list of the Financial Action Task Force for not taking sufficient action against terror outfits. Now, it may be added in the black list of FATF,” she said.
“Even Pakistan has admitted that they are on the verge of being blacklisted because of India’s campaign. Why did such things not happen earlier? Because Modi hai to mumkin hai (With Modi, it is possible),” said the BJP leader.
When queried on National Conference president Farooq Abdullah’s allegation that the Modi government was lying about the shooting down of a Pakistani F-16 in the aerial engagement on February 27, she said the Indian Air Force had already presented proof to establish it.
“There are many who are spreading such misinformation.
Those who are questioning our army are part of the bhajan mandli of the Congress. What more I can say when some Indians are saying such things. It is painful” she said.
Responding to a question about Rahul Gandhi’s allegations of irregularities in the Rafale deal and the involvement of Anil Ambani, Sitharaman dared the Congress chief to provide proof.
“Just show a simple proof to validate your allegation that Rs 30,000 crore was given to him (Ambani). If you can’t show that proof, you do not have any right to say that the PM is a thief. I challenge you to show proof. If you cannot, you must stop levelling false and baseless allegations,” she said.
The Congress allegations have been refuted routinely by the Centre as well as Ambani.
She was here to campaign for BJP national president Amit Shah who is contesting from Gandhinagar Lok Sabha seat.
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