Terming the Goods and Services Tax (GST) as tax terrorism, former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said on Saturday that along with demonetisation it took away more than 31,000 jobs in Surat, and wondered why Prime Minister Narendra Modi did not understand the pain his decisions had unleashed on the poor.
Singh, who was here in the textile hub, said that while Modi claimed to understand Gujarat and the poor "more than anybody else", how was it that "he never understood the pain his decisions unleashed".
Commenting on the spirit of Surat textile hub and their protest against the implementation of the GST, he said "Surat voiced the biggest protests in India against this injustice by the NDA government. You after all come from the land of two great souls, Mahatma Gandhi and Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel.
"It was in your backyard in Dandi where the Mahatma decided to protest against the unjust British tax on salt. Voicing injustice is in your blood which you have showed again against the shoddy implementation of GST," he said.
--IANS
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