Saturday, 05 February 2022 | PNS | Dehradun
The former chief minister of Madhya Pradesh (MP) and senior leader of Congress party Digvijaya Singh has said that the ideology of BJP is anti-poor and the only agenda of the party is to divide the country on communal lines. He said that central agencies such as Enforcement Directorate (ED), Intelligence Bureau (IB) and Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) have become tools in the hands of the ruling party to harass the opposition. Singh was interacting with the media persons at Congress headquarters here on Friday. Accusing the BJP government of supporting the industrialists, he said that the percentage of direct taxes ( Income tax + Corporate tax) was 55 per cent while indirect taxes were 44 per cent in the year 2014 when Manmohan Singh was the Prime Minister. He said that it has now reversed to 45 per cent direct and 54 per cent indirect taxes and the government has reduced the corporate tax which clearly shows that the prosperous are being benefitted at the cost of the poor. Singh said that the gap between the poor and rich is increasing. Giving the example of import duty on edible oil the former CM of MP said that it is lowered and increased to benefit the big corporate houses. He said that the decision of demonetisation resulted in unemployment of three crore workers . Singh said that PM Modi had promised to provide homes to all and double the income of farmers by the year 2022 but his government has failed on these fronts. He said that instead of doubling the income of farmers the cost of seeds, farm equipment and fertiliser have doubled. The Congress leader said that the rate of unemployment which was at 5.2 per cent in the year 2014 increased to 6.7 per cent in the year 2019 and in 2021 it has further increased to 7.8 per cent. He added that the Modi government has failed to bring the black money to the country and in fact the money deposited by Indians in Swiss banks has increased. On the Pegasus spyware software Singh said that the government has not yet acknowledged that it has purchased the software from NSO company of Israel. He claimed the Facebook which owns WhatsApp has registered a complaint against NSO that its spyware software has snooped on 1,400 phone numbers.
Praising the manifesto released by the Congress party in Uttarakhand Singh said that the women who got free cylinders under Ujjwala scheme are not able to refill their cylinders and the Congress party’s promise of providing cylinder at Rs 500 would bring relief to them. He said that the promise to provide a sum of Rs 40,000 per year to five lakh families is inspired by the Nyaya Yojana of Rahul Gandhi. He said that the Congress has focussed on reducing unemployment, controlling prices, health and education while BJP plays communal politics.
The general secretary of Congress Mohan Prakash, the national spokesman Gaurav Vallabh, general secretary (Organisation) of Uttarakhand Congress Mathura Dutt Joshi, State media in-charge Rajeev Mehrishi and Garima Dasauni were present on the occasion.
