5 uncharacteristically strong digs that Former PM Manmohan Singh took at Narendra Modi and the BJP Govt

Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has always been known to be the ‘silent PM’. All throughout his 10-year tenure at the helm of affairs as the Prime Minister of India, from 2004 to 2014, the Prime Minister was accused of not interacting more with either the media or the citizens of the country. Infact, things became too hot to handle once the scams started coming out into the open. First the 2G scam in 2010, followed by the CWG scam and then the coal scam, severely marred the Congress party’s reputation and did irreversible damage to even Singh’s reputation, who was till then hailed as the ‘cleanest politician’ and was extended wide acclaim for having brought around the very first round of economic liberalisation to India in 1991 as the Finance Minister (under the aegis of Narasimha Rao).

Today, just a day after fresh allegations were levelled against him by former Telecom Regulatory Authority of India Chairman, Pradeep Baijal, Singh told a gathering of young, budding politicians of NSUI that most of the claims being made by the Narendra Modi and the BJP government were all false.

Here, we list down for you the top 5 digs the former Prime Minister leveled at all the allegations that have been made against him, his leadership and his family, in an extremely candid address.

1) Manmohan Singh said, “The UPA has always fought against corruption. We will continue to do so,” and went on to say, “I have never used the office to enrich the coffers of my family, or that of my friends or that of my political party.”

2) On the claims that the BJP government has been making about the reforms the NDA government has brought to the economy within a year of its coming to power, Singh said, “We have a duty to our citizens of telling the truth. All of us have an obligation to give out the correct information to our people. You can’t make false talk about the UPA government.”

3) He also claimed that most of the ‘achievements’ that the BJP government was laying claim to was in fact, revamped versions of schemes that were launched by the UPA regime, a claim that many an expert has in the past reiterated. He said, “Be it the National Rural Health Mission or the Jawaharlal Nehru Urban Renewal Mission. These were schemes that were launched during the UPA regimen and that have been subsequently revamped and relaunched by the BJP government.”

4) Singh went on to say, “All the talk about improvement in the economy that the BJP is talking about. Just go around and see for yourself and look at the data. Investment is not increasing. Farming sector has seen no increase. 65% of our country is represented by the rural population and they are in distress. When over 65% of a country’s population is in distress, how can you claim that the country is progressing?”

5) Singh also took a dig at Modi’s pet project, The Make in India. He said, “What is this Make in India? This is nothing but a revamped version of the UPA’s new National Manufacturing Policy, under which we had promised to increase the share of manufacturing to GDP to 25% by 2025. The BJP’s claims are no different.”