Rahul hits back after Modi targets Gandhi family

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi on Friday faced off in a war of words, signalling stormy times in Parliament during the budget session.

Accusing Congress president Sonia Gandhi and Mr. Rahul Gandhi of not having adjusted to their defeat in the 2014 general election and therefore obstructing Parliament and the passage of important Bills, Prime Minister Narendra Modi minced no words in attacking the Gandhi family. He was addressing tea garden workers in Assam, a State set to go to the polls in the early part of the year. “Those who have lost the election [in 2014] and have come down from 400 [seats] to 40 have decided not to allow Modi to work. They have decided to create obstacles and difficulties. The conspiracy is going on,” he said.

In Delhi, Mr. Gandhi said: “The job of the Prime Minister is to run the government, not to make excuses.”

“They have now decided to take revenge on people, on the poor workers for voting the Congress out of power,” he claimed.

“The country is not going to benefit from this politics of negativism and obstructionism. There is only one family with such a thinking, which has brought this kind of destruction. Leaders in the other Opposition parties are not like this.”

Mr. Gandhi, who was in Delhi addressing Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) chiefs on the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) while the Prime Minister was speaking in Assam, reacted sharply to these words.

“All that the Prime Minister has been doing for the last 18 months is to make excuses for why the economy is not running, why the farmer is not getting his due, why the labourers are not getting what they should get,” he said.

“India did not choose Modiji to make excuses, they chose a leader, and he should not make excuses.”

Mr. Gandhi also said that he found it “surprising” that “big industrialists” were complaining to him [Rahul Gandhi].

“Big industrialists are coming to us and telling us that Modiji may be running the government for us, but he is not able to do our work. Therefore Modiji will certainly make excuses. This government acts only in the interest of three or four of its crony capitalist friends,” he said.

The sharp exchange of words between the Prime Minister and the Congress vice-president has put a huge question mark on the functioning of the budget session.

Just a day earlier, Parliamentary Affairs Minister M. Venkaiah Naidu had held a meeting with Opposition leaders to consult them on the dates for the session, and had hoped that contentious legislation, like the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Bill could be cleared.

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All you need to know about GST

What is the Goods and Services Tax?

As the name suggests, it is a tax levied when a consumer buys a good or service. It is meant to be a single, comprehensive tax that will subsume all the other smaller indirect taxes on consumption like service tax, etc. This is how it is done in most developed countries.

What is preventing GST from being a reality?

A major change like GST requires a constitutional amendment, which requires a bill to passed in both houses of Parliament. The GST constitutional amendment bill was passed in the Lok Sabha in May this year.

It has been held up in the Rajya Sabha due to objections being raised by the Opposition regarding the Bill as well as issues with no direct connection to GST.

The Bill was also placed before a Rajya Sabha select committee, which made its recommendations regarding changes to the Bill. The Cabinet cleared these changes in July.

What are the Opposition’s objections?

The Congress wants a provision capping the GST rate at 18 per cent to be added to the Bill itself.

It also wants to scrap the proposed 1 per cent additional levy (over and above the GST) for manufacturing states.

This levy was demanded by manufacturing states who argued that they needed to be compensated for the investment they had made in improving their manufacturing capabilities. The Centre had agreed to this demand to encourage the states to support the GST Bill.

The third demand by the Congress was to change the composition of the GST council—the body that decides the various nitty-gritty’s like rates of tax, period of levy of additional tax, principles of supply, special provisions to certain states, etc. The proposed composition is for the Council to be two-thirds comprised from states and one-third from the Centre.

The Congress wants the Centre’s share to be reduced to one-fourth.

This demand, however, was rejected by even the Rajya Sabha Standing Committee.

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Ten things to know about the GST Bill


1 Officially, the Constitution (One Hundred and Twenty-Second Amendment) Bill 2014.
2 It was introduced in the Lok Sabha on December 19, 2014 by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley.
3 The Bill seeks to amend the Constitution to introduce a goods and services tax (GST) which will subsumes various Central indirect taxes, including the Central Excise Duty, Countervailing Duty, Service Tax, etc. It also subsumes State value added tax (VAT), octroi and entry tax, luxury tax, etc.
4 The Bill inserts a new Article in the Constitution make legislation on the taxation of goods and services a concurrent power of the Centre and the States.
5 The Bill seeks to shift the restriction on States for taxing the sale or purchase of goods to the supply of goods or services.
6 The Bill seeks to establish a GST Council tasked with optimising tax collection for goods and services by the State and Centre. The Council will consist of the Union Finance Minister (as Chairman), the Union Minister of State in charge of revenue or Finance, and the Minister in charge of Finance or Taxation or any other, nominated by each State government.
7 The GST Council will be the body that decides which taxes levied by the Centre, States and local bodies will go into the GST; which goods and services will be subjected to GST; and the basis and the rates at which GST will be applied.
8 Under the Bill, alcoholic liquor for human consumption is exempted from GST. Also, it will be up to the GST Council to decide when GST would be levied on various categories of fuel, including crude oil and petrol.
9 The Centre will levy an additional one per cent tax on the supply of goods in the course of inter-State trade, which will go to the States for two years or till when the GST Council decides.

10 Parliament can decide on compensating States for up to a five-year period if States incur losses by implementation of GST.

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