PM Narendra Modi Making People Miss Manmohan Singh Days: BJP’s Arun Shourie

BJP leader Arun Shourie on Monday hit out at the Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government, saying that managing the economy for them meant “managing headlines.” Its lack of direction is making people miss Dr Manmohan Singh and that people had started recalling the days of former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

Arun Shourie comments on PM Narendra Modi

Arun Shourie said that a year-and-a-half into the NDA government’s tenure, people in India had started “missing the days of former PM Manmohan Singh.” “Doctor Singh (Manmohan Singh) ko log yaad karne lag gaye hain (People have started recalling the days of Manmohan Singh). The way to characterise policies of the government is – Congress plus a cow. Policies are the same,” Mr Shourie, once a vocal supporter of Mr Modi, made these comments during a panel discussion at book launch function.

The function to launch ‘Turn of The Tortoise,’ authored by former Business Standard Editor-in-Chief T N Ninan, was attended by Manmohan Singh, Chief Economic Advisor Arvind Subramanian and former Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran in Delhi.

Pointing out differences between the present and the previous governments, Shourie said, “there is a clearer belief (in the present dispensation) that managing economy means managing the headlines and this is not really going to work.”

Targeting Modi, the former NDA minister said, “I feel there was never a weaker a PMO as now”. He said, “There has never been as great a centralisation of functions, not power, of functions in PMO as now.”

When asked how he would distinguish the NDA from the UPA, Mr Shourie described the policies of PM Modi’s government as “Congress scaled plus a cow”, an acerbic comment on the BJP’s repeated invoking of cow protection after the mob killing of a man in Dadri last month over rumors that he had eaten beef.

Emphasising on decentralising functions and maintaining cordial relations with all, Shourie went on to advice the government that it should stop doing “stupid things.”  Mr Shourie also said, “People say, at least Dr Singh was wise.” Dr Manmohan Singh was in the audience when these comments were made.

“If you see impediments that were there in tax administration, there is virtually no change. Banking reform has been delayed by year and a half for no reason. So therefore this tortoise is very generous metaphor. Ye to so hi jata hai (this tortoise goes to sleep).” He claimed that industrialists are afraid of speaking against the government.

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