Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu on Monday said the demonetisation, rising fuel price inflation, depreciation of the rupee and the failure to arrest the piling up of Non-Performing Assets (NPAs) in the banking sector and recover the black money stashed abroad pushed the economy to the brink.
“People have suffered a lot due to the Modi government’s policies, which actually retarded growth over the last one and a half years. The situation would have been better under any other dispensation,” he told media persons at the Secretariat. He said the economy was performing well due to its strong fundamentals and not because the NDA government did great things.
He said the possibility of the petrol price touching ₹100 a litre could not be dismissed and that the constant erosion of the value of rupee in the international markets were major setbacks to the economy.
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Mr. Naidu said demonetisation was a big jolt and his recommendations that notes of ₹2,000 and ₹500 denomination be removed from circulation and new ₹200 and ₹100 be introduced and digital currency incentivised were ignored.
The NPAs were being sold at throwaway prices in the name of insolvency resolution, many ATMs still had no cash while the ill-gotten money in the Swiss bank was swelling. All these things dealt a severe blow to the economy but the Central government was diverting the public attention from its failures, Mr. Naidu added.