New Delhi, Jun 12 (IANS): The BJP on Monday hit back at Congress for calling "wheels" of the Indian economy "punctured" and accused it of making "baseless and irresponsible" allegations against the government.

"Allegations labelled by (former Finance Minister P.) Chidambaram are baseless and irresponsible. He has raised the issue of growth rate while we have emerged today as the fastest growing economy in the world.

"This quarter (4th of FY 2018), the growth rate was 7.7 per cent. It was more than that of 2014 when they (UPA) left the government. We maintained the pattern of growth rate even when the situation in the world was different," Union Minister Prakash Javadekar told reporters here at a press conference.

Attacking the Congress, he said that it was their record that growth rate was always low while the rate of inflation was always high.

"Our government has changed it. The growth rate has increased while the rate of inflation has gone down," he said.

Javadekar was responding to Chidambaram's remarks in which he said that three out of the four wheels - exports, private investment, capital formation - of the national economy have been "punctured" and held the BJP government's "administrative incompetence", "reckless decisions" and "policy blunders" responsible for the rising farm distress, unemployment and economic failure.

He said the only tyre that seemed to be inflated was government expenditure.

"But here too, the government's options are getting limited because of the pressure on the current account deficit (CAD) and the fiscal deficit (FD)," he said.

Chidambaram said the gross NPAs (Non-Performing Assets) had risen in the last four years from Rs 2,63,000 crore to Rs 10,30,000 crore and would rise further.

Responding to the charges on NPA, Javadekar blamed Congress for the NPA crisis.

He said that the government is working seriously on long term solution over the hikes in rates of petrol and diesel prices.