Congress leader Rahul Gandhi said on Saturday that the government needs to infuse cash into the economy as soon as possible or else "the poor will be decimated, the middle class will be the new poor and crony capitalists will own the country."

Gandhi quoted a new report about the adverse condition of retrenched workers of a private company, who now have a long battle against economic conditions ahead of them.

Gandhi has asked the Centre to give Rs 10,000 to every poor family immediately and provide them with Rs 7,500 on a month based manner for the next six months if the government wants them to survive the aftermath of the coronavirus lockdown.

He has also called for a fiscal stimulus package for the small and medium industries.

"If the Government of India doesn't inject cash to start the economy now: the poor will be decimated. The middle class will become the new poor. Crony capitalists will own the entire country," Gandhi said on

Twitter on Saturday.

The Congress leader has been asking the government to provide cash in the hands of the people and to the small industries, to enable them to restart the economy, which has suffered a setback due to the coronavirus-induced lockdown.

The government has also held back the release of complete data of index of industrial production (IIP) for April, saying it is not appropriate to compare the

IIP data with earlier months due to COVID-19 lockdown.

(With inputs from PTI)