Shillong, Feb 6: The Congress on Monday slammed the Centre alleging that the BJP government is protecting its business partner Gautam Adani at the cost of the ordinary people’s investment and savings.
Addressing a press conference, the AICC media coordinator advocate Mathew Antony said that as per the United States short selling research company Hindenburg’s investigative research report, Adani family enterprises’ wealth has seen an astonishing growth in the last 7 years to the tune of $218 billion at INR 82 Rs per dollar ( Rs 17,98064 crore,)and in the last 3 years, the personal wealth of Gautam Adani rose from a modest $20 bn to that of a $120 bn (Rs 9,84,000 crore) making him one of the richest in the world.
The major concerns raised by the report are that stock price is manipulated by accounting fraud and by doing accounting fraud without proper disclosures to the regulators, the books were manipulated to show inflated business credentials.
Raising concerns, Antony said that LIC and SBI where many of the ordinary people have trusted their money, savings and retirement funds are also having sizable investments in the Adani companies.
LIC has an investment of 4.47 billion $ in Adani amounting to an approximate value of Rs 56142 crore on January 27 after the market loss of Rs 32,000 crore. SBI has loans of Rs 27,000 crore against the total bank loans of Adani at Rs 80,000 crore.
According to the AICC leader, Adani is for BJP what the East India company was for the British.
“The country faced similar investor wealth erosion during the Satyam computers accounting scam of Rs 7800 crore in 2009 and IL&FS scam in 2018 started with 1000 crore loan default. In both the cases the promoters were arrested. In the case of IL&FS a company almost similar to that of Adani’s business, the senior management was fired and immediate investigations were ordered by the serious fraud investigation office as well as an investigation was commissioned from the Institute of Chartered Accountants Association”, he said.
Antony said the Congress is concerned about the people of Meghalaya.
“What if BJP elected to power directly or in alliance, will sell all the state assets of electricity, airport and other infrastructure to the Adanis like the East India companies forced invasion”, Antony said.
‘Centre against minorities’
Commenting on the BJP statement on Christian minorities and the tribal communities, the AICC leader said that in the recent finance budget, the political intent of the BJP towards the Christians, minorities and the Scheduled Tribe was glaringly reflected, where the budget estimates and the revised estimates are given below, where the government has not spent the amounts
On the BJP Statement on their fake love for Christians, minorities and the Tribal communities, here are a few facts
In the recent finance budgets the political intent of the BJP towards the Christians, minorities and the Scheduled Tribe is glaringly reflected, as the government has not spent the amounts provisioned in the budget for the minorities.
For the development of minorities, out of the budget estimate of Rs 1810 crore, only Rs 530 crore wss spent. The entire budget for the minorities itself was very low and from that too Rs 1280 crore was not spent.
The development of Scheduled Tribe had an allocation of Rs 4111 crore out of which Rs 3874 crore was spent.
Antony said the anti-conversion bill passed in Karnataka in January 2021 ‘Karnataka Protection of Right to Freedom of Religion bill -2022’ has put the entire Christian community and minorities in fear.
With respect to the beef ban, the mob lynching of a 50-year-old Mohammed Aqlaq in Dadri on 28 September 2015 for allegedly carrying beef is still a burning memory in the minds of all Indians. “Needless to remind about the inhuman treatment and false indictment of Father Stan Swamy, who lived his life for the welfare of the tribal community, was tortured to death by the BJP. He will remain a martyr who fought for the people’s rights”, he said.
According to the AICC leader, this demonstrates the double standard, political emptiness and hypocrisy of the BJP and their agenda remains that of the ethnic cleansing of the poor and the minorities to achieve their extremist political ideology.
“The only one party that can be trusted to be secular, balanced and that will remain dutiful to the people is only Congress and the only alternative to save Meghalaya is Congress”, he said.
Concern over low MGNREGS allocation
The Congress Shillong city president Dr. Omarlin Kyndiah said the budget allocation for the flagship Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guaranteed Scheme (MGNREGS) has been slashed to Rs 60000 crore for 2023-24, the lowest in 4 years, almost 32 % lesser than the revised estimate for the last fiscal year.
The scheme provides guaranteed days of wage employment to at least one member of every household. MGNREGS does not only create employment, it also creates assets at the village level.
“Over the years, we have seen that low budgetary allocation has directly impacted the employment opportunity and the average numbers of days of employment, which is at 5 years low with just 42 days of work per household”, he said.
As the India’s unemployment rate increased to 8.30 percent in December 2022, the highest in 16 months, reduction of employment generation scheme like MGNREGS will have a severe crisis in employment for the rural populace, Kyndiah said.
According to the Congress, MGNREGS needs at least Rs 2.72 lakh crore for providing 100 days of work. To sustain the present 42 days’ work, the government will have to allocate Rs 1.2 lakh crore, Kyndiah added.
