Senior Congress leader and former Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram on Monday said that the Narendra Modi-led NDA government has advertised its work better one year after it stormed to power at the Centre.
“All I am saying is that we didn’t trumpet our achievements like this government has done. They have advertised their work better, something we didn’t do,” Chidambaram said while addressing a press conference to discuss the NDA government’s economic growth chart in the last one year.
The former finance minister said that in the last one year the growth has not been very significant. “Credit growth is sluggish, aggregate demand is low and the core sector is performing very poorly”, said Chidambaram.
Stating that it is time for the government to answer as to how they read worrying signals, Chidambaram said, “A large number of projects in public and private sector have been stalled. 161 public sector projects and 565 private sector projects have been stalled”.
Expressing his views on the decline in inflation, Chidambaram said that retail inflation has indeed come down but essential items like milk, few vegetables and pulses still continue to affect the household budget of the common man.
“Inflation began to decline in November 2013 and if you see the graph of both WPI and CPI, you will find that there has been a secular decline. In November 2014, WPI touched zero. Are you seriously suggesting that WPI became zero within just six months?,” asked Chidambaram.
He further stated that measures taken by the UPA and NDA governments together contributed to the decline. “I wish oil prices halved in our tenure. It is because of decline in oil prices that inflation has come down,” he added.
Replying to a question on scams and corruption, Chidambaram said, “There was no scam in the UPA till 2007. We don’t wish a scam for this government. I am happy there is no scam. I don’t wish them to take wrong decisions. If they take right decisions we will be very happy,” said Chidambaram.
