Yashwant Sinha entitled to opinion, but govt won’t flinch: BJP

NEW DELHI: Senior BJP leaders strongly rebutted party veteran Yashwant Sinha's charge that the economy was in a shambles and said India had never been as much a pivot for the world economy as it was since the Modi government assumed office.

Countering Sinha's attack on the government and finance minister Arun Jaitley in particular, railway minister Piyush Goyal said, "The government will not flinch due to some criticism and stay the course as it works to transform the economy." He added that Sinha was entitled to his opinion.

Goyal said the government would continue to take decisions which promoted welfare and pointed out that much of the criticism on social media and other forums was from those who were being forced to comply with rules.

Speaking to the media, home minister Rajnath Singh said, "The whole world admits India is the fastestgrowing economy in the world. No one should forget this fact. In the matter of economy, in the international arena, India's credibility has been established."

In a newspaper article, Sinha criticised Jaitley over what he called the mess in the economy and said sector after sector was in distress. But BJP leaders said bold measures had been taken to bring about "transformative" changes to improve transparency of the economy and rejected Sinha's criticism of demonetisation and GST.

"There is bound to be some uncertainty when some transformative changes are made. It (economy) may take some amount of time to absorb these changes but this will pass," Goyal said, and added that the government was steadfast about ending black money and corruption.

On a possible stimulus package to perk up the economy, Goyal said, "It is too early to walk down that road and the focus right now is on GST." Some announcements related to exports may be made following the GST Council meeting on October 6.

Reacting to criticism of demonetisation, he said it ticked all the boxes and sent out the message that the government meant business when it came to curbing black money and corruption. "It we have to raise skyscrapers, then its foundation has to be strong. And for that we have to dig deep which may bring out some dirt," Goyal said.

BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra said development was not even an issue when UPA was in office, which was marked by scams and a slipping economy.