Maharashtra, Sep 9 (PTI): Congress Vice-president Rahul Gandhi on Friday targeted Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the “failure” of the demonetisation exercise, saying he was unable to comprehend how the idea struck him. “Nobody knows how the idea of demonetisation crept into Modi’s mind. The RBI didn’t know, the chief economist didn’t know, and neither was Raguhuram Rajan (then RBI chief) aware,” Gandhi said, addressing a ‘sangharsh’ rally in Parbhani, Maharashtra.

“Maybe Modi didn’t like the design of (the old) Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes,” the Congress leader quipped. Modi was laughing while saying that from the midnight of November 8 last year these notes will become scrap, Gandhi said, adding people trusted the prime minister as they thought there must be some logic behind demonetisation.

Ridiculing the PM for stating that getting rid of black money was a motive for the exercise, Gandhi said almost 90 per cent of black money lay invested in land, gold, real estate, and in Swiss banks. But he went after the other 10 per cent and not after those 90 per cent, he said. “The ‘success’ of demonetisation is that Modi turned black money of every ‘chor’ (thief) in India into white,” Gandhi said.

The BJP-led government works for 50-60 big industrialists, the Congress leader said, adding it is not bothered about the plight of farmers. “The Rs 35,000 crore loan waiver announced by the BJP-led government in Maharashtra is only a Rs 5,000 crore loan waiver in reality,” Gandhi said.

Over 9,000 farmers have ended their lives in Maharashtra in the last three years, he claimed. Earlier, on way to Parbhani, Rahul Gandhi interacted with farmers at Erandeshwar, and also held discussions with traders on GST at Parbhani before the rally.