If PM can forgive crores of 15 people, then should let go farmers' loan: Rahul

Hyderabad: Congress president Rahul Gandhi said Thursday Narendra Modi has broken every single promise of his, including being an “honest” prime minister.

Speaking at a students’ convention in poll-bound Telangana, he also made a strong pitch for farm loan waiver. Gandhi said Prime Minister Narendra Modi and caretaker Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao “make many, many promises” but do not deliver on them. “The prime minister made promises of depositing Rs 15 lakh in the bank account of every citizen, two crore jobs to youth every year, farm loan waiver and a just minimum support price for farm produce. He also promised he will be the ‘chowkidaar’ of this country and not the prime inister.

“You have seen that he has broken every single promise. He has broken the promise of being an honest prime minister,” he said. Gandhi alleged the prime minister gave Rs 30,000 crore to industrialist Anil Ambani in the Rafale deal but not the farmers their due. “If the Prime Minister of India can write off (rupees) three lakh fifty thousand crore of 15 people…the richest people in the country, then he should be ready to waive the loan of India’s farmers,” he said.

The Congress leader said what he was asking for was fair treatment to everyone. “If you are treating the richest people in the country (well), and you are giving them loan waiver, then you owe that to the farmers of the country also,” Gandhi said. Addressing the convention organised by private educational institutions, he said the Congress party believes in fairness and all its policies are designed to create a level playing field for different sections of people. He also said Rao got a golden opportunity to build a newly created state and do things in a fresh way but he fritted it away by “indulging in corruption and promoting family rule”. Gandhi asked the audience to recollect his speeches of the last 15 years and identify even one commitment he made and did not honour.

“I am not in the habit of lying to our people. I am not in the habit of making false promises. I made a commitment to farmers about agricultural loan waiver in Karnataka and Punjab, and when we were voted to power there, we wrote them off,” he said. Gandhi said he would never make tall promises like creating two crore jobs every year or putting Rs 15 lakh in the bank accounts of people. “It is a matter of my credibility and I take that very seriously,” he asserted.

Gandhi alleged the TRS government had favoured large corporate institutions. Referring to the Congress manifesto, he promised health insurance for the staff of private educational institutions recognised by the government, “reasonable” power tariff and reduction in municipal and property taxes. If voted to power, the Congress-led alliance will also try and revive thousands of minority institutions that failed as a result of the policies of the TRS government, he said.