New Delhi: Rahul Gandhi on Monday questioned the government's celebration of the demonetisation anniversary, saying it was sad that Prime Minister Narendra Modi did not feel the pain of the people.

"Modiji says he will celebrate on November 8. Obviously the Prime Minister couldn't understand the feeling of the people. What is there to celebrate, it is a sad occasion. Notebandi was an out and out disaster," the Congress vice-president said, after a meeting of party office-bearers that decided on protest programmes in every district to mark the day.

Rahul also said that GST was an example of how to destroy a good idea. "Our Punjab finance minister Manpreet Badal said at the meeting, Modiji hit the economy with two torpedoes. Economy survived demonetisation but he again torpedoed it with a flawed GST. But the Prime Minister doesn't understand he so badly hurt India," he said.

Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, former Union ministers P. Chidambaram and Jairam Ramesh and party general secretaries attended the meeting chaired by Rahul that decided to hold protest rallies in every state capital, protests in every district during the day besides candle light marches at 8pm - to coincide with the time of Modi's televised announcement on November 8 last year - in memory of those who lost their lives and jobs.

Spokesperson Randeep Surjewala made the announcement and said: "All Opposition parties will observe black day to protest against the biggest scam of the century under the theme Desh bhugat raha hai (The country is suffering). He explained how the stated objectives of demonetisation were not achieved and said: "Even GST compliance has become an impossibility. Life has become miserable for small traders; the network crashes regularly and the complexities are creating a chaotic situation."

Manpreet Badal went a step further, saying: "Now there is a doubt on Modiji's neeyat (intention) and a question mark over his credibility. Lofty rhetoric cannot be a replacement for sound planning. We will fight for the ordinary people, small traders and MSMEs (micro, small and medium enterprises). The people's court is bigger than the courts of law and the Congress will take the fight there."

Asked why the concerns were not raised at the initial stages in the GST Council, Badal said: "We found certain amount of arrogance in the government but after the groundswell of Opposition and (Yashwant) Sinha's article, there is a change in attitude."

Manmohan Singh, who reiterated that "notebandi was organised loot and legalised plunder" today pointed to faulty design and poor architecture of the GST and expressed concern over compliance issues affecting business.