Modi will be remembered as a 'job destroyer': Congress

Talking to reporters here, AICC spokesperson Jairam Ramesh said: "In an interview to a TV channel, the PM has said that the Opposition had no right to talk of jobs loss. He has claimed that the NDA governemt generated lakhs of jobs through the Mudra Yojana."

"However, the reality is that nearly one crore jobs were lost last year due to demonetisation and the faulty implementation of the GST. As Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy data, in 2018 one crore people become jobless due to note ban and implementation of GST in haste. So far, India has had 11 prime ministers and Mr Modi was the 12th one. During everyone's tenure, jobs were created. But for the first time in the history of our country, jobs were destroyed instead of being generated. The history will remember Prime Minister Narendra Modi as job destroyer Prime Minister," he said.

Hitting back at the Prime Minister's remarks in a TV interview that the Opposition had not right to abuse or question the government of the day, the senior Congress leader said the PM had no right to lie before the country.

"In a TV interview, the prime minister has said that the Opposition has no right to question but we say that the Prime Minister also doesn't have any right to speak lies. He always says during my tenure there was huge job generation," said Ramesh, who was the environment minister in the Manmohan Singh government during 2013-14.

Ramesh said that time and again, the Prime Minister in public rallies had mentioned that his government has created jobs for 25 crore families under the Mudra Yojna, but in 2018 only India has lost one crore jobs due to note ban and GST.

"As per the government's report 90 per cent of Mudra Yojna beneficiaries got the loan of Rs 25,000. With this sum, how much jobs one can create. I think it's a biggest lie that the Prime Minister has spoken," Mr Ramesh said.

In this context, he said that in Parliament, finance minister Arun Jaitley had, in reply to a question, said that job generation under Mudra Yojna was not maintained centrally.

'When the finance minister announced the Mudra scheme in 2015, the primary objective of the scheme was to refinance the financial institutions who would provide loans to people at subsidised rates. But the prime minister has changed the definition of Mudra. The assistance which was given to MSMEs sectors since long were brought under the same scheme," he added.

Describing unemployment as the biggest issue in the coming elections, Ramesh said, "In 2019 elections, unemployment is the major issue. There is a need of one surgical strike on unemployment. Carrying out surgical strike on borders and space is a different matter. Note ban and GST in haste was a surgical strike. With this, one crore people have suffered."

Charging the PM of diverting attention from the issue of job loss, he said, "The PM knows that it is impossible for him to get another term in 2019 on this issue."