Manmohan Singh speaks out at last

After one year of demonetisation, previous Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Tuesday, 07 November 2017 said that the Demonetisation and Goods and Services Tax (GST) were poorly designed and very hastily implemented over the country.

The Congress had already announced that it would observe November 8, the day demonetisation, as ‘black day’.

He said that during his tenure as PM of the country, his government had originally come up with GST, but Narendra Modi was at the head of the section blocking it and the present GST is a great leap away from their vision. He further said that GST has been converted into a complicated mess because of multiple slabs and additional cess which is a burden. He also accused the government of Gujarat of selling forest lands to industries rather than allowing tribals to farm on the land.

Repeating his speech from Rajya Sabha, he compared demonetisation to legalised plunder. According to him, the day of demonetisation was a black day for Indian economy and democracy. He said that such a coercive step has not been taken in any economy across the world.

He claimed that these economic reforms taken by the NDA government had only helped our rival, China, since exports have rapidly increased this year.

Industries in Vapi, Surat, Morbi and other parts of Gujarat were damaged by demonetisation and GST implementation, he said, adding that these measures had decreased small businesses. He also said that, along with demonetisation, GST has founded a feeling of tax-terrorism in the country.

He criticised the current Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi on his presonal project, the Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train corridor. He said that the project is vane. But he defended himself by asking if raising questions on bullet trains makes one anti-development? Or does questioning the financial policies like GST and demonetisation makes one a tax evader?

-Archit