New Delhi, Jun 14 (NIE): Union minister Arun Jaitley Wednesday took a swipe at Congress chief Rahul Gandhi for his continuing criticism of the Prime Minister and alleged that Congress party is now shorn of any ideology, obsessed only with “a person called Narendra Modi”. In a blog post on Facebook, Jaitley wrote, “In dynastic parties political positions are heritable. Unfortunately, wisdom is not heritable. It has to be acquired through learning.” Rahul has continuously criticised the Modi government for waiving loans amounting to Rs 2.5 lakh crore availed by big corporates, as also the Mudra Yojana, a scheme to provide loans to small entrepreneurs.
Pointing out that the UPA government had indiscriminately lent money through banks to 15 big loan defaulters between 2008 and 2014, Jaitley wrote that Rahul prefers the “Gobbelian traditions to say the exact opposite”.
“For a president of a national party not to understand this basic procedure of bank functioning should be a matter of concern to the entire party as also the country,” he wrote in the post titled ‘Is Congress Becoming Ideologyless? Is Anti-Modism its only ideology?’
Trying to state that there is no dearth of skilled workers in India and that budding small entrepreneurs struggle to get the backing of the government and banks, Rahul, addressing OBC workers in his party at a convention Monday, had cited examples of successful US entrepreneurs to attack Modi’s policies. He described the founder of Coca-Cola as a shikanji seller and that of McDonald’s as initially a dhaba owner.
Referring to this, Jaitley wrote, “Though factually what he stated was incorrect, the larger point is that he saw virtues in these professions, which can act as a launch pad for many start-ups…. The great-grandson of the man who authored ‘The Discovery of India’ could with his customary inaccuracies one day give to this country his monumental work on ‘The Rediscovery of Coca-Cola’.”
Jaitley alleged that there has been no ideological pattern in Rahul’s statements. “Ignorance with anti-Modism is a common thread,” he stated. Dynastic political parties are family- and personality-dominated, and ideology takes a backseat, he maintained.
“The leader’s ill-informed instincts become the ideology. This can only happen to a party which becomes ideologyless; pushes itself to the fringe; is willing to act as a tailender to regional parties. All this because its only obsession is a person called Narendra Modi,” Jaitley wrote. He took potshots at Rahul for suggesting a single GST rate—like Singapore. Pointing out that Singapore charges 7 per cent GST on all food items, cheap clothing, medical and education spends, and on BMW cars, Jaitley asked: “Should we have same rate for food items, hawai chappals and BMW cars?.”