PM gives excuses, BJP destroying pro-poor policies: Rahul

Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi on Friday attacked Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his government for giving excuses on various issues and charged the BJP with "destroying" all pro-poor policies initiated by his party.

"The prime minister's job is to run the country, not to make excuses. All that the prime minister has been doing for the last 18 months is to make excuses as to why the economy is not running, why farmers are not getting their due, why labourers are not getting what they should get," the Congress leader said.

"India did not choose Narendra Modi to make excuses. India chose a leader and the leader should not make excuses; the leader should do the job he has been elected to do," Gandhi said while addressing a meeting of Pradesh Congress Committee presidents at the Congress office here.

"We have been attacking the government for being anti-poor, anti-farmer, anti-labourer and anti-worker. I wanted to get a sense from PCC presidents about what is being done with regard to Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act scheme, right to food act and tribal bills in their states and how the BJP is attacking and trying to destroy these laws," he said after the meeting.

"They have given quite a good presentation. As an opposition party, we want to put pressure on the government so that they pay attention to the poor, to the pain of farmers in India, pain of workers and labourers in this country," he added.

"We are not going to let the Bharatiya Janata Party run a government that acts only in the interest of three or four of their crony capitalist friends," Gandhi said.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday took a potshot at the Congress leadership, saying that while the opposition wanted parliament to function, one family holding a grudge for its electoral defeat was not allowing the Rajya Sabha to function.

"Those who were reduced from 400 seats to 40 seats (in the Lok Sabha) are creating obstacles. Opposition parties want parliament to function, but just one family which is holding grudge for the defeat (in 2014 general elections) is not allowing the Rajya Sabha to function," Modi said in his address at an impressive public rally at Moran in Upper Assam's Dibrugarh district.