Rahul Gandhi slams PM Modi over unemployment, recalls his pakoda remark

Congress president Rahul Gandhi Thursday hit out at Prime Minister Narendra Modi over unemployment, taunting him for a remark that selling `pakodas' is a job worth doing.

Addressing an election rally here, Gandhi claimed that unemployment in the country is the highest now in 45 years."This is Modi's contribution," he said. "Make in India, start up India, sit down India, pakodas,” the Congress leader said, mocking the schemes started by the BJP government at the Centre “Initially, he talked about Make in India, then Startup India, then Stand-Up India and finally he ended on pakodas," Gandhi said.

In an interview last year, the prime minister had given pakoda-selling as an example of worthwhile employment. Rahul Gandhi also accused Modi of spreading hatred. "Wherever he goes, there is hatred. In Haryana, one community is made to fight against the other. When he goes to Tamil Nadu, he will criticise somebody.

In Maharashtra, he will speak against the people of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. People of one religion are made to fight against the other,” Gandhi said. He asked the prime minister to tell what has been achieved in his term. "I want to ask you what you have done in the last five years. What have you given to the country?" Gandhi said. He said Nyay, the minimum income support scheme promised by his party, will not burden the middle class.

The scheme promises Rs 72,000 per year to the poorest families in the country. “I am giving you the guarantee that not even a single penny will be charged from the middle class and they will not be taxed for the Nyay scheme,” he said.

The opposition leader said funds for the scheme will come from the pockets of those rich industrialists who have been given undue favours under the Modi regime. The BJP, which has criticised the scheme, has sought to know how it will be funded. Gandhi was addressing the rally in support of Haryana Congress president Ashok Tanwar, who is contesting from Sirsa.

Tanwar is pitted against Indian National Lok Dal's sitting MP Charanjeet Singh Rori and Bharatiya Janata Party's Sunita Duggal. Ghulam Nabi Azad, the Congress general secretary in charge of Haryana, also addressed the meeting. Polling for Haryana's 10 Lok Sabha seats will be held in the sixth phase on May 12.

-PTI