Interaction at Princeton University: Cong failed, PM also failing on job front, says Rahul Gandhi

Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi at the Princeton University in New Jersey on Wednesday. (PTI Photo)

Repeatedly emphasising that the key challenge in India today is the lack of job creation, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday said 30,000 youngsters enter the job market every day, while only 450 jobs are provided.

Interacting with students of Princeton University in New Jersey, USA, Rahul said, “The challenge is how to solve that job problem in a democratic environment. Frankly, the Congress party was unable to do it. That is why (Narendra) Modi came. But Modi (too) is unable to do it,” he added.

There is “anger building up in India right now” over that failure on the jobs front, which “we can sense”, Rahul said.

In fact, Rahul mentioned the words “jobs”, lack of its growth and the problem of unemployment 44 times during his interaction spanning just over an hour. It is being seen as an indication that the Congress vice-president may be ready to give primacy to issues such as slowdown in economic growth and joblessness to take on Modi and reach out to the youth.

Rahul referred to the “politics of polarisation” once on Tuesday, but framed it in the context of it hampering economic growth and social development, and creating spaces for hostile neighbours to create trouble.

Asked for his view on the rise of charismatic leaders such as Modi and Donald Trump displacing political elites in India and the US, Rahul said, “I think the central reason why Narendra Modi rose, and to an extent why Donald Trump came (as US President), is the question of jobs in India and in the US. There is a large part of our populations that simply does not have jobs and cannot see a future; they are feeling pain. And they have supported these types of leaders.”

But the “problem” for both leaders, he said, is their record on the jobs front. “I do not know Trump. But certainly our Prime Minister is not doing enough (in creating jobs),” he said. “So those same people who got angry with us (UPA), because we could not deliver on those 30,000 jobs, are going to get angry with Modi. The central question is resolving that problem. My main issue with Modi is that he diverts that issue and points finger somewhere else instead of saying, ‘Listen we have a problem’.”

Rahul parried a question on uniform civil code — a divisive issue on which the Congress had taken a clear position in the past — and said he would “leave that idea to the courts of our country”.