Never named PM Modi or 15 lakhs: Nitin Gadkari

Clarifying over his alleged statement that "BJP made tall promises in 2014 elections", Union Minister Nitin Gadkari on Wednesday said that the reports are "false and baseless" and that he never made such statements.

Speaking to the media, Gadkari further said that he did not say anything on Prime Minister Narendra Modi or the Indian government and depositing Rs 15 lakh in everyone's account.

Earlier, several reports claimed that Gadkari, during an interview to a Marathi news channel, said that Modi government came to power on the basis of unrealistic promises. Congress president Rahul Gandhi had also shared the video of the interview on Twitter and said, "People also think that the government has made their dreams and hopes a victim of its greed."

Stating that his statement was twisted and then published in an English newspaper, Gadkari said, "An English newspaper based out of Delhi twisted my statement. I never named Prime Minister Modi, or 15 Lakh or any such thing. This is completely baseless news. I want to appeal to all to watch the actual interview to get the context of what we were talking about. The programme was in Marathi and I wonder since when has Rahul Gandhi started understanding Marathi."

Further hitting out at the Congress president, the minister asked him to learn Marathi for a better understanding of his interviews content. "I also want to appeal to Rahul Gandhi to learn Marathi and not write anything on Twitter without understanding something," he added.

Clarifying his reported statement, Gadkari said, "Seven-eight days back I went to the Marathi channel for the interview. I told them that during Maharashtra elections Devendra Fadnavis and Gopinath Munde were discussing a poll promise about toll plaza. I objected to it by saying that it would be very tough to implement and hence we should not make such a promise. I mentioned to them that we have mostly been into opposition and have less experience of being in power, hence we face some issues while making poll promises," he added.