Let Rahul Gandhi become PM, and we’ll see: Raj Thackeray

MNS chief calls PM Narendra Modi’s tenure “disastrous”

Launching a sharp attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) chief Raj Thackeray in his annual Gudi Padwa speech on Saturday said his tenure as PM had been “disastrous”. Raj said he was not averse to Congress president Rahul Gandhi becoming the prime minister. “Let Rahul become the PM and let us see,” he said.

MNS chief Raj Thackeray addresses the public during his annual Gudi Padwa rally at Shivaji Park in Mumbai on Saturday. (Anshuman Poyrekar/HT Photo)

“Right from Jawaharlal Nehru till now, people never decided the prime minister. If tomorrow Rahul Gandhi becomes the prime minister, we will also experiment with him,” said Raj. “We tried Modi, but he was disastrous. Let Rahul become the PM and let us see. If the country is fortunate enough, he will do some good thing.”

Raj accused Modi of emulating the policies of Adolf Hitler to run down his opponents. “Hitler used to muzzle the flow of information to the citizens. But fortunately (today) we have the social media, which was not the case previously. Similarly, anyone who criticised Hitler’s policies was declared as anti-national. There is no scope left to seek answers,” he added.

The MNS chief showed clippings of Harisal village in Amravati district, which was touted as the country’s first ideal digital village after being adopted by a software giant. “I had sent my party workers to study this village. They were just empty claims made the government and everything was a mess. Modi has only wasted his massive mandate,” said Raj.