New Delhi: The Congress on Friday slammed the Centre over its handling of the economy as the value of currency crossed Rs 82 per Dollar.
“Rupee has hit a historic low of 82.33 to a dollar, 100 billion Dollars worth of forex reserves have been eroded since the beginning of this year, twin deficit problems of Current Account Deficit and Fiscal Deficit are looming large, Trade Deficit has doubled over 1 year period, exports have dipped by nearly 3.5 percent, FMCG sale has dipped by 10 percent, this low consumption has slowed down investment further, MSMEs have shut down and unemployment is on the rise. All this topped by high prices impacts the poor the most. And given high inflation, RBI has raised rates 4 times - which will make EMIs higher and loans costlier,” Congress spokesperson Supriya Shrinate said.
According to the Congress spokesperson, most of the international rating agencies and institutions had downgraded projections of the Indian economy. “World Bank’s decision to reduce India’s estimated GDP growth rate for the third time this year is not in isolation.
Moody’s, Fitch, and Asian Development Bank among many others have similarly cut the forecast. Now, given the Modi government’s nature, it may be perceived as an international conspiracy against India, and maybe ED will be unleashed against the World Bank as well,” said Shrinate.
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She noted that poverty had grown in the country but the government was ignoring the issue.
“Poverty has worsened in India, a report by the World Bank has red-flagged the fact that nearly 5.6 crore people have been pushed into extreme poverty during the COVID pandemic. The World Bank has also for the third time cut the estimated GDP growth for India from 7.5 percent to 6.5 percent. This will mean higher joblessness and more poverty,” Shrinate said.
“The World Bank’s estimates of poverty in India are actually lesser than the situation on the ground. Some economists believe that nearly 27 to 30 crore Indians were pushed into abject poverty during the COVID pandemic. According to the Niti Aayog on multi-lateral poverty index, nearly 25 percent of people in the country are poor,” she said.
The Congress spokesperson said that her party has been flagging the issue of economic mismanagement for a long but the government never took the issue seriously. “I would like to remind the PM of his earlier statements when he used to link the sliding rupee to the reputation of the central government,” said Shrinate.
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“It was precisely due to the apprehension of rising poverty that the Congress President Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi had both suggested to PM Modi and his government that money should be given directly to the poor so that they can continue to consume.
If only they had paid heed to the suggestions made by the Congress party, the economic situation wouldn’t have been so bad, millions of daily wage laborers wouldn’t have had to walk home, lakhs of MSMEs wouldn’t have had to close down and almost 6 crore people would not have been pushed into abject poverty,” she said.
