Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday termed the scrapped electoral bonds as the "biggest extortion scheme in the world” and called Prime Minister Narendra Modi the “champion of corruption”.
Gandhi was reacting to PM Modi’s recent remarks on the scrapped electoral bonds scheme that it was brought for transparency and to "curb black money in elections. He questioned as to why it was scrapped by the Supreme Court then?
"A few days ago, the Prime Minister gave a very long interview to ANI. It was scripted, but it was a flop show. The Prime Minister tried to explain electoral bonds in it. The Prime Minister says that the system of electoral bonds was brought about for transparency and clean politics. If this is true, then why was that system cancelled by the Supreme Court. And secondly, if you (PM Modi) wanted to bring transparency, then why did you hide the names of those who gave money to BJP. And why did you hide the dates on which they gave you the money?," Gandhi asked.
"This is the biggest extortion scheme in the world. All the businessmen of India understand and know this and no matter how much clarification the Prime Minister wants to give, it will not make any difference. Because the entire country knows that the Prime Minister is the champion of corruption," the Congress leader said while addressing a press conference with Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav in Ghaziabad.
Earlier, in an interview with ANI, PM Modi had said that the electoral bond scheme was aimed at curbing black money in elections and said the opposition wants to run away after making allegations. PM Modi said that "everyone will regret it when there is an honest reflection."
Rahul Gandhi further said that earlier he thought that the BJP would win around 180 seats in the Lok Sabha polls but now they may get 150 seats.
"15-20 days ago I was thinking BJP would win around 180 seats but now I think they will get 150 seats. We are getting reports from every state that we are improving. We have a very strong alliance in Uttar Pradesh and we will perform very well," the Congress leader said.
When asked about whether he will contest the general elections from Amethi or Raebarelli, Gandhi said, "This is the BJP's question; very good. Whatever order I get, I will follow it. In our party, all these (selections of candidates) decisions are taken by the CEC."
Gandhi further elaborated on the party’s election manifesto, saying, “In the last 10 years, PM Modi has reduced the system of employment generation by demonetization, by implementing the wrong GST and by supporting big billionaires like Adani. The first task is to once again strengthen employment, and for that, we have given 23 ideas in our manifesto. One idea is the revolutionary idea of the right to apprenticeship. We have decided that we will give the right to apprenticeship to all the graduates and diploma holders in Uttar Pradesh. There will be training and we will deposit Rs 1 lakh per year in the bank accounts of the youth and we are giving these rights to crores of youth. We will make a law for paper leaks as well."
