Mayawati slams Modi govt over unemployment, economic slowdown

'Weak consumer demand impacting businesses and slowing down economy'

Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) president Mayawati on Wednesday slammed the Narendra Modi government at the Centre for the unemployment and economic slowdown in the country.

Addressing the media on the occasion of her 64th birthday here, Mayawati observed that 1.3 billion people in India were facing tough political, economic and social challenges, which had resulted in widespread poverty and unemployment.

“These factors have slowed down consumer demand in the economy, thus affecting the businesses and industries badly, and contributing to the economic slowdown,” she added.

She alleged these negative socioeconomic factors were the result of the lopsided policies and narrow minded approach of the central government.

Besides, she claimed big government contracts were only being given to a select coterie of industrialists, and there was no provision for giving reservation to the SC, ST and OBC categories therein.

“Therefore, the facility of reservation to these categories in government jobs is now miniscule, which is a cause of concern to our party,” Mayawati added.

However, she did not spare Congress either saying the country had faced similar challenges under the rule of the grand old party, which was the reason that the electorate threw it out of power.

“But, it is unfortunate that the current Bharatiya Janata Party (BSP) is toeing the line of the Congress regimes and putting people to hardships, apart from misusing power for vested political and personal vendetta,” the former Uttar Pradesh chief minister underlined.

She said the people were facing socioeconomic ills viz. poverty, unemployment, corruption, communal violence, riots, depression etc just like they did under the Congress dispensations. "But, the current BJP government has gone even two steps further and the majority of the Indian population is getting severely impacted by these challenges.”

In this context, she claimed Congress did not possess the moral high ground to criticise the BJP government on these counts, since it was no different during its rule.

Although, she attacked the Modi government on the issue of Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), Mayawati maintained the BSP does not hold ‘dharna’ or demonstrations on these topics like other parties nor does its cadre indulge in violence for petty political gains. “BSP is a disciplined cadre based party and it initiates strict action in cases of someone deviating from the principles of the party.”

Meanwhile, Mayawati unveiled the Hindi and English editions of her book ‘A travelogue of my struggle ridden life and BSP movement’, which basically is a compendium of the works done by the party over the past year.

She said the BSP workers will celebrate her birthday as ‘people's welfare day’ and follow the path shown by dalit pantheons, including Jyotiba Phule, Chattrapati Shahuji Maharaj, Narayana Guru, Baba Saheb Dr Bhimrao Ambedkar and Kashiram.