Why is BJP opposing Rahul's minimum income scheme? Congress

The Congress in Madhya Pradesh Thursday said party chief Rahul Gandhi's minimum income scheme was the final assault on poverty and wondered why the BJP was opposing it.

Talking to reporters here, state Congress spokesman Pankaj Chaturvedi said the poor were suffering under the NDA government.

"Rahul ji has said if the Congress was voted to power, its government would roll out a minimum income scheme guaranteeing Rs 72,000 a year to poorest 20 per cent of the households in the country," he said.

The scheme will benefit 25 crore people," he claimed.

"I wonder why the BJP and the Prime Minister have got into the habit of opposing the Congress's schemes for public welfare," he added.

Earlier, they had opposed our public welfare schemes like the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MNREGA) and the National Food Security Act," Chaturvedi added.

The poor were facing a tough time ever since the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi came into power at the Centre, he alleged.

Unemployment, too, had risen manifold under the Modi government, the Congress spokesman claimed.

Besides, the NDA government's decisions like the 2016 note-ban and implementation of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) had ruined the economy and also the poor, he said.