PM’s speech a blank page with just a headline: Chidambaram

Congress leader and former finance minister P Chidambaram while dubbing Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s announcement of the ₹20 lakh crore stimulus package “a blank page with just a headline”, has said that he has his eyes peeled to see if 13 crore impoverished families in the country get their due share of the package.

“Yesterday, PM gave us a headline and blank page. Naturally, my reaction was a blank!” Chidambaram said in a series of tweets on Wednesday (May 13).

Yesterday, PM gave us a headline and a blank page. Naturally, my reaction was a blank!

Today, we look forward to the FM filling the blank page. We will carefully count every ADDITIONAL rupee that the government will actually infuse into the economy.

— P. Chidambaram (@PChidambaram_IN) May 13, 2020

Modi on Tuesday (May 12) announced a stimulus package of ₹20 lakh crore, to help revive the Indian economy. He said, the package has been designed to help labourers, farmers, tax payers, MSME’s and cottage industries. It includes assistance for Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and a stimulus of ₹1.74 lakh crore announced earlier in March.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is slated to elucidate on the package at 4 pm on Wednesday.

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Tweeting that he awaits the announcement by Sitharaman, Chidambaram said he will carefully count every rupee that is infused into the economy and see if the bottom half of the population of 13 crore families get “real money”.

“Today, we look forward to the FM filling the blank page. We will carefully count every additional rupee that the government will actually infuse into the economy,” he said.

“We will also carefully examine who gets what? And the first thing we will look for is what the poor, hungry and devastated migrant workers can expect after they have walked hundreds of kilometres to their home states.”

We will also carefully examine who gets what?
And the first thing we will look for is what the poor, hungry and devastated migrant workers can expect after they have walked hundreds of kilometres to their home states.

— P. Chidambaram (@PChidambaram_IN) May 13, 2020

The Congress of late has been harping on the need to put money in the hands of the poor to increase spending and kickstart the economy. The party has also been critical of the central government over the migrant crisis. Party president Sonia Gandhi, recently volunteered to foot the train fare of thousands of migrant labouers for whom the Centre had arranged Shramik Special trains to ferry them home, but hadn’t waived the fare.

Modi is his 8 pm address on Tuesday also stressed the necessity for India to be self-reliant. While many had expected the prime minister to speak about a possible extension of the on-going, no such announcement was made. Modi just mentioned that information regarding it would be announced before May 18.