Congress backs FDI in retail sector, slam opposition
New Delhi: New Delhi: In a bid to give a push to the UPA government’s economic agenda ahead of the 2014 general elections and counter its detractors, especially in the wake several corruption scandals, the Congress on Sunday held a mega rally at the Ramlila Maidan here.
The rally was addressed by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Congress president Sonia Gandhi and general secretary Rahul Gandhi among others, and was utilised as a launch pad for counter offensive against the Opposition, especially the BJP.
“FDI in retail will not only benefit farmers but also unemployed youth and the common man,” Congress president Sonia Gandhi told a capacity crowd of mainly rural supporters in New Delhi’s Ramlila Maidan ground, which holds about 50,000 people. More stood outside.
In October, Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz told an Indian newspaper that foreign supermarket investment would not benefit India and could cost manufacturing jobs if the retailers sourced from China.
Gandhi, who heads a dynasty that predates India’s independence from Britain in 1947 and who is seen as the country’s most powerful politician, last week promoted the new retail policy with apple farmers in Himachal Pradesh before Sunday’s election in the mountainous state.
Her son Rahul Gandhi, expected to head the party’s campaign for a 2014 general election, also defended the policy at the rally. The crowd, many wearing pink turbans and carrying placards in favour of foreign investment, were mainly men and women from the north Indian farming states of Rajasthan, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh.
“We support the government’s decision on FDI. The opposition is only confusing the people,” said Laxmi Devi, from the poor state of Bihar.
