New Delhi, April 28: Rejecting exit poll results, the BJP today produced a certificate from Goldman Sachs to show India is shining and would shine brighter within 30 years.
The report from the renowned global fund manager says India is set to become one of the world’s three largest economies in under three decades.
It says that, compared with China, “the best growth is yet to occur…(but) India has set up the necessary conditions to support long-term growth path”, law minister Arun Jaitley said.
Distributing the operative part of the report at a media briefing here today, Jaitley said this showed India’s economy had grown strong under the leadership of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.
“It was under the present government that the nation had been put on the path of rapid economic growth, while on the other side there is chaos,” he said.
The report, he added, has lauded India’s reforms record and said “making progress in infrastructure is one of the hallmarks of the present government’s India shining campaign”.
Also singled out for praise are industrial policy, trade reforms, agriculture, disinvestment, electricity, governance, capital market and banking reforms — in which the report says significant progress has been made, the minister and BJP spokesman said.
Jaitley took the opportunity to say that “I don’t see any adverse impact of the exit polls (on the BJP) in the third and fourth phase of polls as they have a history of going wrong”.
“I am not accusing psephologists or TV channels but even in the past they have made honest mistakes,” he added. “I would only say that people should remember their mistakes.”
Pollsters should exercise “greater responsibility” because “if you get into the system, you would not know where it would end”, he said.
Asked why his party had then used exit poll results favourable to it just like the Congress had done, Jaitley said: “We are in competitive politics and definitely we would take advantage of it (poll results).”
“I don’t comment on what the channels say,” he said, asked about some TV exit polls forecasting a hung House and an outcome not too favourable to the BJP.
“If psephologists want to tell us the results in advance, they should also be conscious of the fact that they too have a responsibility. I normally don’t join issue on these matters, but it only reinforces the view that there is need for public audit when the results are declared.”