Opposition leader Rahul Gandhi, on a tour of Germany, has accused Narendra Modi of taking late Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s economic model to the “extreme right”, leading to its collapse.
Rahul said Prime Minister Modi was incapable of building a different model “because he’s invested too much in the Adanis and the Ambanis of this world”.
Rahul was speaking at the Hertie School — an academic institution for the study of governance — in Berlin. He also called electoral contests between INDIA parties “tactical”, and said he did not oppose arms purchases from Israel.
In response to a question from an Indian student about whether there was still hope despite the “total ideological and institutional capture by the ruling government”, Rahul replied: “We had a model that worked for us from 1990 to, I’d say, 2012-13. What PM Modi and the BJP and the RSS have done is they’ve extended that model.
“So if you look at what they’re doing, they have essentially taken the economic ideas of Manmohan Singh and taken them right to the extreme right, where we wouldn’t take them and we wouldn’t allow them to go. But what one has to realise is that the model has collapsed and the entire conversation that is taking place now, including this conversation, is about what does the next model of Indian growth look like?”
He added: “I can tell you already that what Mr Modi is trying to do economically reached the end of its possibilities about four to five years ago…. So even if he decides now that you know he wants to build a different type of model, he can’t do it. He’s stuck because he’s invested too much in the Adanis and the Ambanis of this world.”
Answering the query, Rahul said: “So the real interesting thing for me is what does that new model look like?... It has to have a production that occurs in a democratic environment…. It has to have a vision for the environment. It has to have a vision for the weaker sections of society, the more marginalised sections of society. But it has to create prosperity. It cannot just create prosperity for 10 businessmen or 50 businessmen or 100 businessmen.
“So all the angst you’re feeling is actually the collapse of a model. And the hope is and in fact you people are going to help build it.”
To a question on the lack of activity in the INDIA bloc, the Congress leader said: “All the parties of INDIA do not agree with the basic ideology of the RSS…. So we are very much united on that question. But we have tactical contests that take place and we will continue to have them. But you will see that when it comes to the Opposition requiring unity and you see it every day in Parliament… and we will contest the BJP on laws that we disagree with.
“It’s a deeper battle now than simply elections. Now we are fighting a battle for an alternate vision of India.
“When you have one woman who votes 200 times in a polling booth in Haryana, what the BJP is saying is this woman has 200 times the value of a normal Indian…. The reason they’re attacking the voting system is they fundamentally don’t believe that every Indian is equal. In their mind, and I’ve spoken to them… there is no way a Dalit person is the same as an upper caste person.”
On Indian arms imports from Israel, Rahul said: “In a complex environment, we have to defend ourselves. We are trying to become self-sufficient in that space…. But we can’t get away from the fact that we need to buy weapons from the best possible
supplier, right?”