GUWAHATI, Sept 3 - Dubbing demonetisation as the �biggest scam in the country�, which besides �destroying the economy, gave relief to the rich and the criminals at the cost of the poor and the honest citizens�, Assam Pradesh Congress Committee president Ripun Bora yesterday asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to own responsibility and resign.
Citing the recent RBI report which states that 99 per cent of all scrapped currency of Rs 500 and Rs 1000 denominations were returned to banks, Bora said the �arbitrary and whimsical� decision did irreparable loss to the country.
�In monetary terms, only Rs 16,000 crore worth demonetised notes did not come back. RBI, on the other hand, spent Rs 21,000 crore in printing new currency notes for remonetisation. There is a direct loss of Rs 5,000 crore,� Bora told a press conference here.
Bora said the �anti-national act� dented the institutional sanctity of RBI and now the credibility of the apex bank is in question. �It is estimated that the GDP will decline by 2 per cent at the end of this quarter. A decline of 1 per cent of GDP means a loss of Rs 1.5 lakh crore,� he said, adding that the economy got such a shock that all parameters are showing downward trend.
�All economists were of the same opinion that a parallel economy run by black money exists in India. But now all the money is white money. So, where has all the black money gone? Demonetisation was a window given by Modi to black money holders to convert the money into white,� he alleged.
Asserting that the people did not give Modi a mandate to destroy the economy, he said the Central Statistics Office report says the economic growth rate sank to a three-year low to 5.7 per cent whereas the government was expecting a rate of 7 per cent. Some key sectors like manufacturing, mining, financial services and the informal sector lost growth momentum due to the demonetisation, he added.
Pointing to steep hike in prices of petrol, LPG and other commodities, the State Congress president also slammed the BJP government for failing to check price rise.
�During the Congress government, when the rate of LPG was Rs 380, BJP leaders Sushma Swaraj and Arun Jaitley had taken out a protest march with cylinders. Now the price is around Rs 720,� he said.
Bora said the government does not have any concern for the common man and its only objective is to satisfy the big businessmen and capitalists.
Bora further said the process of collecting data for Aadhaar cards should start after the NRC is updated.
