Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Congress President Sonia Gandhi have sent a strong message through their speeches that the path of reforms on which the government has embarked on is here to stay. While addressing thousands of people at the Congress party’s mega rally organised at Ramlila Maidan here on Sunday, Singh and Gandhi reiterated that the government’s decision of allowing FDI in multi brand retail was a necessary step to meet the socio-economic challenges facing the country.
Senior Congress leaders, including Commerce Minister Anand Sharma, Minister of State in PM’s Office V Narayanasamy, Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, Congress ministers, MPs and senior party functionaries from all over the country took part in the rally.
Speaking on the government’s decision to allow FDI in multi brand retail, Singh said, “It is in the interest of the common man and farmers. Today, a large amount of food gets perished due to the absence of essential transport and storage facilities. The decision to allow FDI in multi brand retail will not only make these basic services available, but the common man will get food at low prices. This decision will also generate employment for lakhs of people.”
Singh said this is not the first time the country has allowed FDI, it had been done in 1991 too and the good results of those decisions are before all today. There was opposition in 1991 also, but policies were changed, and the positive results proved critics wrong. “Even now they would be proved wrong,” Singh said.