Modi spreading bluff on NPAs, BJP govt is to be blamed for the mess: Congress

The Congress on Thursday made a strong attack on PM Modi for his remarks on NPAs.

New Delhi: A day after Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched a blistering attack on the previous Congress- led UPA regime over banks' non performing assets (NPA), Congress said that the BJP government is to be blamed for the mess.

“PM Modi said that NPA is a big scam. We agree with him. And if NPA is a scam, then who gave birth to this scam?,” Congress spokesperson Randeep Surjewala asked in an AICC press conference on Thursday.

The biggest scam and increase of NPAs has happened in three and a half years of BJP Government, he said.

The Congress made a strong attack on the Election Commission, accusing it of becoming a "puppet" in the hands of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The party strongly objected to Modi`s "roadshow" after he voted in Ahmedabad which it said was a flagrant violation of the model code of conduct.

Surjewala tweeted:

Biggest Scam and Increase of NPAs has happened in 3½ years of BJP Government | Our Statement calling Shri Modi's bluff. pic.twitter.com/NkMa7FmY26 — Randeep S Surjewala (@rssurjewala) December 14, 2017

Modi yesterday said that banks were pressured to give loans worth thousands of crores of rupees to select industrialists in a scam bigger than 2G, coal and Commonwealth Games scams.

Speaking at the 90th AGM of industry association Ficci, Modi said the non performing asset (NPA) or bad loans problem is a "liability" handed over by "economists" in the previous regime.

Hard-selling his government's pro-poor policies, he listed out initiatives like free cooking gas connections to women, bank accounts to every household, loans to the youth and affordable housing, taken since 2014.

Modi said loans extended to select industrialists by pressuring banks was a loot of public money.

Calling it a "scam", he said this was bigger than the Commonwealth Games, 2G telecom spectrum allocation and coal block allocation scams.

Modi said his government is formulating policies keeping in mind the need of businesses, abolishing archaic and obsolete laws.

Industry, he said, had been long demanding Goods and Services Tax (GST) and the BJP-led government implemented it and introduced measures like anti-profiteering to see that industry passes on the benefit of lower taxes to the people.