Modi, Kumar slug it out at panel meet
Accusations flew back and forth between Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi and MoS planning Ashwini Kumar over India's economic situation on Friday. Chetan Chauhan reports.
Accusations flew back and forth between Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi and MoS planning Ashwini Kumar over India's economic situation on Friday.
Modi went ballistic, holding Prime Minister Manmohan Singh responsible for the dip in economic growth and said the central government had been hit by "policy paralysis".
The CM's onslaught began after Kumar told reporters that Gujarat was lacking in some areas and that the data given by the state government regarding out of school children differed from the one provided by the plan panel. Gujarat claimed less than one lakh children were out of school whereas the plan panel put the figure at 1.53 lakh.
Modi had come to meet the plan panel and finalise the state's annual plan pegged at Rs. 51,000 crore for current fiscal.
But once the meeting got over, the verbal duel began with plan panel deputy chairperson Montek Singh Ahluwalia as the spectator.
Blaming the Centre for doing nothing to revive the economy, Modi said, "The central government made 20 policy announcements but no final decision has been taken."
Terming that the economic growth was struck, Modi said the Centre was in total paralysis and it was a matter of "deep" concern.
Kumar tried to do some damage control and blamed global economic situation for India's falling economic growth. "India is integrated with global economic stream," he said in his rebuttal to Modi.
He emphasised that the US too had lowered its economic growth target.
