‘Electoral Bonds’ biggest corruption scandal on planet: Rahul Gandhi

Kozhikode (Kerala), April 16: Taking a jibe at Prime Minister Narendra Modi for trying to defend the electoral bond scheme, senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi today alleged that it was the biggest corruption scandal on the planet through which BJP had collected thousands of crores of rupees.

Addressing a public meeting during his ‘Janasamparkam’ (public outreach) programme here today, Gandhi described the ‘electoral bonds’ as “biggest corruption scandal on the planet, through which BJP has got thousands of crores of rupees by extorting it from India’s businessmen”.

He asked people to look at the dates when money was given. “You will find that the CBI was deployed against a businessman and a few days later, a few weeks later he pays the BJP”, he said, adding, “another businessman was given a road contract of thousands of crores and immediately after getting the road contract, he pays the BJP in Electoral Bonds”.

“Modi calls it electoral bonds, actually what the common thief is doing on the street, the Prime Minister is doing at an international level”, he remarked, while equating the scheme with street level extortionists and thieves.

Accusing the Prime Minister of protecting only the richest people in the country, he pointed out how the PM waived off Rs 16 lakh crores of loans of just about 22-25 people.

Gandhi alleged that Modi even uses agencies to promote the business of his friends like Adani. Giving examples of the Mumbai airport, Gandhi reminded that the original owner of the Mumbai Airport, got a CBI inquiry, they obviously interrogated him, threatened him a little bit and within a month or two he sold the Mumbai Airport to Adani.

“ED people will come, CBI people will come, Income Tax people will come, then they will threaten the businessman, they will interrogate him and then at the end of the interrogation, they will say, look, why don’t you just give this to Adani?” he said, while pointing out how the agencies were being used to promote Adani’s business.

Asserting that the current issue was not merely of changing the government but defending the constitution of the country, he said, “there is only one big issue in this election that is the RSS and the BJP are trying to destroy India’s Constitution and the UDF, the Congress and the INDIA alliance is trying to save the Constitution of India, that is the central issue”.

Talking about the Congress’ guarantees, he said, one woman in every poor family in India will get Rs one lakh per annum, which means Rs 8,500 every month directly in her bank account.

Similarly for educated youth, he said, the Congress party will bring Right to Apprenticeship for all graduates and diploma holders. Under the apprenticeship programme they will get a guarantee to work in the private sector, in the public sector and in PSU units and in the process they will get Rs one lakh for the first year. This he pointed out is the job guarantee for every graduate and diploma holder immediately after completing his/her education.

Gandhi said he was seized of some pressing local problems like the man-animal conflict, ban on night traffic and opening up of the Medical College. “I am fully committed to make sure that they happen and if the Left Front government is not ready to do it, then when the UDF government comes in power in Kerala, which it will soon, we will do it”, he assured.