Jaitley on Rahul: 'How much does he know? When will he know?'

Hitting back at Congress president Rahul Gandhi for his attack on the Modi government in his speech in Madhya Pradesh on Wednesday, senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Arun Jaitley said, 'How much does he know? When will he know?'.

"Every time I listen to the view of Rahul Gandhi, both inside and outside Parliament, I ask myself the same question, how much does he know? When will he know," Jaitley, who is recuperating from a kidney transplant surgery, said in a Facebook post.

Earlier in the day, Gandhi had addressed a rally at Pipliya Mandi in Mandsaur district to mark the first anniversary of police firing during an agitation in which six farmers were killed. In his speech, Gandhi took at dig at Prime Minister Narendra Modi, saying loans were given to industrialists and not to farmers.

"Listening to his speech delivered in Madhya Pradesh today reaffirms my curiosity about the answer. Is he being inadequately briefed or is he being a little too liberal with his facts," Jaitley wrote.

The BJP leader also refuted Gandhi's accusation that Modi has waived the loans of Rs 2.5 lakh crore of 15 top industrialists in the country. The government, he said has not waived a single rupee due from any industrialist. The facts are wrong, he said.

"Those who owed money to the banks and other creditors have been declared insolvent and removed from their companies by IBC enacted by Prime Minister Modi's government. These loans were given largely during the UPA Government," Jaitley said.

Jaitley also said that Gandhi's comment that Modi had given Rs 35,000 crore each to two diamond jewellers who have now escaped out of country is factually false. The banking fraud started since 2011 when the UPA II was in power and it was only detected during the NDA period, he said.

Gandhi was, perhaps, referring to absconding diamond jeweller Nirav Modi and his uncle Mehul Choksi who have allegedly defrauded Punjab National Bank of over Rs 13,000 crore through fraudulent Letters of Undertaking (LoUs).

Jaitley then said the bulk of today's NPA or bad loans were given by the banking system during the period 2008-14.

"From 2014, we have been systematically taking one step after the other to recover these monies back" the post said.

And, on Gandhi's charge that jobs are not being created, Jaitley cited the latest GDP data.

"There is a double digit growth in construction, expansion in manufacturing, an increased capital formation which indicates investment increase, large investment in physical infrastructure and increased investment in rural India. All these are job creating sectors," he said.

Jaitley then mocked at Gandhi’s assertion that a Congress government in Madhya Pradesh will connect farms and villages to the cities. "His impression is of the Digvijay Singh era in Madhya Pradesh," he retorted.

Jaitley also mentioned that poor quality roads was one key reason for ousting the Congress in MP in 2003.

"Thanks to Shri Shivraj Singh Chouhan (Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh) and Prime Minister Modi who during the NDA Government, has tripled the investment in rural roads, in comparison to what the UPA spent, there is a revolution in the Gram Sadak Yojana," he added.