‘PM intellectually dishonest’

Picking holes in Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s claim that the UPA has done better than the NDA, senior BJP leader and former finance minister Yashwant Sinha claimed that Dr Singh is being “intellectually dishonest” in making growth comparison between the two regimes. “The Prime Minister is being less than intellectually honest when he is comparing the NDA to UPA. It is a usual trick of intellectual dishonesty to dress up facts and figures. So, he is not talking of 5 per cent growth but an average of eight years,” Mr Sinha said. The BJP leader’s comment came after Dr Singh, while addressing the Assocham meet on Friday, took a dig at the Opposition, saying its criticism of the government’s way of handling the economy is distorted. He said, “Our political critics focus on the experience of one bad year, it makes for good television but is a distorted picture. The average growth rate in eight years was 8.2 per cent, much better than previous eight years.” However, Mr Sinha alleged that the Prime Minister’s speech held out no hope, as he only tried to diagnose, but failed to prescribe any remedy. “The whole world knows economy is in crisis and the PM offers no hope,” he said. Meanwhile, hitting out at Mr Sinha for his criticism against the Prime Minister, information and broadcasting minister Manish Tewari said he was “amazed’ at the statement. “I am quite amazed at times as to how in the kind of global economic environment we are in, can any responsible political party really criticise a five to six per cent growth in the economy when most major economies are either registering a negative growth or barely positive How can any responsible person, who has been the finance minister of India be completely oblivious or close his eyes to the facts,” Mr Tewari said. Admitting that the economy isn’t currently at its best, Mr Tewari said that the UPA-led government is committed to the process of bringing India back to a very high growth rate trajectory. “The reforms in the FDI sector that have just been announced, (and) the decisions taken on the Cabinet Committee on Infrastructure to try and unlock the bottlenecks are all steps in this direction,” he assured.