In appeal to Punjab voters, Manmohan Singh slams PM Modi for ‘hate speeches’
Manmohan Singh said Modi ji iwas the first PM “to lower the dignity of public discourse, and thereby the gravity of the office off the Prime Minister”
NEW DELHI: Former prime minister Manmohan Singh, 91, on Thursday sharply criticised PM Narendra Modi, 73, for his election campaign pitch, accusing him of indulging in the “most vicious form of hate speeches” and describing him as the first prime minister to lower the dignity of public discourse.
In his appeal to the people of Punjab who are due to vote on June 1, Singh said this was one final chance to ensure that “democracy and Constitution are protected from the repeated assaults of a despotic regime trying to unleash dictatorship in India”.
“No prime minister in the past has uttered such hateful, unparliamentary and coarse terms, meant to target either a specific section of the society or the opposition. He has also attributed some false statements to me. I have never in my life singled out one community from the other. That is the sole copyright of the BJP,” Singh, who retired from the Rajya Sabha in March, said in a three-page open letter.
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Singh, who was the prime minister of a Congress-led coalition for a decade until 2014, asserted that only the Congress could ensure a growth-oriented progressive future where democracy and the Constitution will be safeguarded.
He said that though PM Modi promised a doubling of the farmer’s income by 2022, his government’s policies in the last ten years have eroded the earnings of the farmers.
“The national average monthly income of farmers is a meagre Rs. 27 rupees per day, while average debt per farmer is Rs. 27,000 (NSSO). The high cost of input, including fuel and fertilizers, coupled with GST on at least 35 farm-related equipment and whimsical decision-making in farm export and import, has destroyed the savings of our farm households and left them on the margins of our society,” he said.
The senior Congress leader also hit out at the BJP government for imposing an “ill-conceived” Agniveer scheme on the armed forces. “The BJP thinks that the value of patriotism, bravery and service is only four years. This shows their fake nationalism,” he said in a letter to voters of Punjab.
