Ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to the United States where he is scheduled to address the Indian diaspora at an event called ‘Howdy Modi’ on September 22, former Congress chief Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday played on the colloquial American expression to take a dig at Mr. Modi over the state of the economy.
“‘Howdy’ economy doin', Mr Modi? Ain't too good it seems,” Mr Gandhi said on Twitter, using the hashtag “HowdyEconomy”.
At the Houston event, President Donald Trump is joining the Prime Minister.
For the past several weeks, the Congress has been attacking the Modi government on the economic slowdown and its handling of the economy.
“By showing glitter, saying 5 trillion, 5 trillion, everyday or by doing media's headline management, economy cannot be improved. Investors do not come by sponsoring events abroad,” party general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra said on twitter.
“The confidence of investors is shaken and the foundation of economic investment has cracked. But the BJP government is refusing to acknowledge this truth. This slowdown is a speed breaker in the direction of becoming an economic superpower,” she tweeted in Hindi with the hashtag ‘BJP bad for business’.
LIC issue
The Congress also questioned the Modi government’s use of funds held by the Life Insurance Corporation (LIC).
At a press conference, Congress leader Ajay Maken quoted reports of the Reserve Bank of India and the State Bank of India research cell to allege that the LIC’s exposure to risky public sector undertakings (PSU) and financial institutions now stood at ₹22.64 lakh crore, a jump of ₹10.7 lakh crore in the past five years.
“You can understand the situation when I point out that from 1947 to 2014, LIC’s exposure to risky PSUs was ₹11.94 lakh crore. It has doubled in the past five years. That means what was not done since Independence has been done in five years,” Mr. Maken said.
As an example, he pointed out that the LIC had infused ₹21,000 crore into the IDBI Bank by raising its equity to 51%. “But all that got wiped out and the Union Cabinet has approved a fresh infusion of ₹9,300 crore,” he added.
