Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s disregard towards democratic principles has brought the country to the brink of an economic abyss, said senior Congress leader and former Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan on Monday.
On the tension between the Modi-government and the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Mr. Chavan said that the crucial November 19 RBI Board meet would result either in a servile central bank or the resignation of the RBI Governor Urjit Patel.
“The country is staring at a fiscal deficit crisis brought about by the Prime Minister’s actions. To cover this up, the government is now toying with invoking of the hitherto unused Section 7 of the RBI Act, 1934 to transfer a portion of the central bank’s reserves to its account,” he said.
Mr. Chavan compared the schism between the Centre and the RBI to the economic crisis in Argentina in 2010, when differences with the President forced the Argentine central bank’s governor to step down.
The Congress leader further said that if the Modi government did make use of Section 7 under the guise of ‘public interest’, it would cause “an economic earthquake”.
Remarking that demonetisation had ravaged the lives of crores of people besides causing unprecedented economic chaos, The former Chief Minister likened Mr. Modi’s demonetisation decision to Muhammad bin Tughlaq’s infamous ‘currency change’ move in the 14thcentury.
The real motive behind the move and Mr. Modi’s relentless drive towards a cashless economy was to benefit the American fintech corporations, he said.
‘No one consulted’
“When the decision to demonetise was taken, the government’s intention seemed good. But it immediately became clear that Mr. Modi did not consult anyone before taking this step. It is incredible that the RBI cleared the move barely three hours before the Prime Minister’s official announcement,” Mr. Chavan said.
Instead of achieving any of the targets set for it, demonetisation turned into the “biggest money-laundering operation,” Mr. Chavan said.
“Not even Arun Jaitley was aware of the particulars of the move. One wonders whether Mr. Modi takes the advice of political adventurers like yoga guru Baba Ramdev on such important matters,” he said.
The BJP government has steadily undermined every institution in the country, be it the RBI or the CBI, he said.
He further said that the move to replace former CBI Director Alok Verma was nothing less than “a coup” engineered by the Prime Minister to cover up the Rafale scam.