BJP wants to destroy informal sector of economy: Rahul Gandhi

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Monday (August 31) alleged that the BJP government at the Centre is hellbent on destroying the informal sector of the economy – the farmers, labourers and the medium-sized trade enterprises.

His remarks came amid fears that the Indian economy will see its first-ever quarterly economic contraction since such data began to be published in the mid-1990s.

“There is an attempt to turn you into a slave,” said the former Congress chief in a video on the present state of economy. The video is a part of Rahul’s fresh series on economy. He had earlier come out with a five-part series on Chinese incursions in Ladakh.

“You know the big companies which constitute the formal sector. The informal sector comprises farmers, labourers and MSMEs. Till the time India’s informal sector is strong, no economic storm can touch India,” he said.

“But in the last six years, the BJP government has been attacking the informal sector. I am giving you three examples right now — demonetisation, wrong Goods and Services Tax (GST) and the lockdown enforced to contain the coronavirus pandemic,” said Rahul.

Related News: RBI has confirmed what I’ve been warning for months, says Rahul Gandhi

“Don’t think the lockdown was unplanned. Don’t think it was done at the last minute. The aim of these three decisions was to destroy our informal sector,” the Congress leader alleged.

Since March 25, India has witnessed several phases of a nationwide lockdown to contain the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic. Rahul had earlier written to Prime Minister Modi, saying such measures would have serious consequences on the economy.

In his new video, Rahul said the PM “needs the media and marketing” to run the government. “This media management and marketing is done by 15-20 people,” he said.

Rahul sought to remind the people that in 2008, an economic crisis had affected the leading economies of the world. In the US and Europe, banks collapsed, corporations and companies shuttered their businesses. “but India remained unaffected largely,” said Rahul.

India had a UPA government at that time. “I asked then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh the reason why India has remained unaffected? He told me ‘if you want to understand India’s economy, you will have to understand that India has two economic structures’. One is the formal and the other is the informal economy’,” he said.

The informal sector, he said, has a lot of money which the government cannot touch. “They want to break this sector and extort this money from them,” he alleged.

Related News: Congress denies Rahul Gandhi’s ‘colluding with BJP’ remark

“The results will be that India won’t be able to produce jobs because the informal sector produces most of the jobs. Once the informal sector is destroyed, India won’t be able to produce jobs,” he said.

The Congress has been very critical of the government over unemployment, saying it has assumed dangerous proportions. It said the record of “45 years of unemployment” has been broken as around 135 million people are likely to lose their jobs due to Covid-19.

In May this year, the party had said the low GDP growth in the last quarter of 2019-20 was “a telling commentary” on the BJP-led government’s economic management and its misplaced priorities. It said the low GDP growth in the last quarter of 2019-20 was “a telling commentary” on the BJP-led government’s economic management and its misplaced priorities.

“We had forecast that GDP for Q4 will touch a new low at below 4%. It has turned out to be worse at 3.1%. Remember, this is pre-lockdown. Of the 91 days of Q4, lockdown applied only to 7 days. It is a telling commentary on the economic management of the BJP government,” said former finance minister P Chidambaram in a tweet.

Related News: BJP, RSS control Facebook: Rahul Gandhi after US media report