BHOPAL: Hitting back at Sonia Gandhi over her barbs against him, Prime Minister Narendra Modi today alleged that "scamsters are unnerved" due to the tough stance of the government on black money and are putting "roadblocks" in the reforms agenda.
Attacking the Congress President for her remarks on Tuesday that the Prime Minister has been "reduced to unedifying flip flops" and most of his poll promises were nothing more than "hawabaazi" (empty talk), he said the "hawalabaaz" (scamsters) are seeking answers from him even as his government has plugged leakages in schemes and enriched the nation's coffers.
Addressing BJP workers here, Modi said that Congress was resorting to "disruptive tactics" as it was not being able to come to terms with its defeat in 2014 Lok Sabha polls. Singling out Congress for the complete washout of Monsoon Session of Parliament and blaming it for delaying Goods and Services Tax (GST), he said even as other parties favoured that the House should run and the business be transacted, "there is one, which does not accept this".
"I wonder whether there is a place for an attitude of confrontation due to sheer arrogance in a democracy. I had publicly appealed to the party, which has been defeated and has been rejected by the people, to allow Parliament to function. While the world is facing a huge economic crisis, India is standing on its feet. Today the country has a never before opportunity to move forward. Let us not waste it," he said.
The Prime Minister said, "We had not prorogued the Monsoon Session with the hope that the opposition party will take into account the hopes and aspirations of the country. But they did not accept and finally with a heavy heart and sadness, we had to decide to prorogue the session yesterday." Maintaining that in a democracy political parties should introspect on how to strengthen themselves if they lose elections, Modi said if people elected somebody for five years, the mandate has to be respected.
"I know their problem. One after another decisions are being taken by this government. The 'hawalabaaz' are disturbed due to the tough law that we have made against black money. The land beneath them is slipping away. They are sensing the danger hovering around them. This group of 'hawalabaaz' is trying to put roadblocks," he said.
The government had yesterday given up its plan to reconvene the Monsoon Session of Parliament to get GST Constitutional Amendment Bill approved as Congress virtually scuttled the move. The government had kept the Monsoon Session alive in the hope of building a consensus on GST, billed as one of the biggest economic reforms. The NDA had planned to roll it out from April next year.
The Prime Minister, however, said that the government will not leave any stone unturned to remove "such roadblocks" in the way of decisions for the people's welfare while respecting democratic norms and expressed the hope that "some way will be found out". Linking the Congress opposition to GST and its protests during the Monsoon Session to its electoral defeat, Modi recalled that when BJP had won only two seats in the 1984 Lok Sabha polls, the then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi used "ridicule" BJP in Parliament.
"We had to hear such barbs. Then there came a time that the party (Congress), which had once got 400 seats, got reduced to a mere 40. But when we got the defeat in 1984, we tried to learn from it. We examined where we went wrong, introspected over them from top to bottom and asked from the people as well as journalists as to how we got such a massive drubbing. "We did not put the blame on others. We did not criticise others. We looked within and tried to remove our shortcomings and now after 30 years, the people have given government with single party majority," he said.
Debunking Congress criticism of the NDA government doing nothing on any front, the Prime Minsiter listed the cash transfer of gas subsidy, Jan Dhan Yojana, Mudra bank and other schemes as hallmarks of his government's commitment towards the common man. He said that his government was bringing changes at the ground level without any publicity.
Thanking people of Madhya Pradesh for voting for BJP from Parliament to Panchayat polls, Modi said that he will work towards fulfilling the aspirations of the people.