New Delhi: China is “sitting inside” India because the Make in India “initiative has failed”, Leader of Opposition (LoP) in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi said Monday, stressing on the need to focus “completely on production” to avoid escalating social tensions due to growing unemployment.
Rahul also took a swipe at Prime Minister Narendra Modi, saying had the INDIA bloc been in power, it would not have sent the External Affairs Minister “three or four times” to the United States to secure an invite to the American President’s “coronation”, but focused instead on building a production system strong enough that would compel America to extend an invite.
Participating in the motion of thanks to the President’s address during the joint sitting of the House on the inaugural day of the ongoing budget session, Rahul identified India’s lack of manufacturing prowess as the reason behind China’s aggressives moves on the border.
He said a government under the INDIA bloc would have focused on harnessing the power of AI to not just challenge the Chinese on the production front, but also “revolutionise the participation of Dalits, OBCs, adivasis, in the ruling of this country, in the institutions of this country, in distribution of wealth of this country” by running the data generated from a caste census through AI tools.
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China, he said, has the “guts to come inside this country” as it has a “far stronger, far bigger” industrial system, adding that the Army chief had contradicted PM Modi’s claim that India has not ceded an inch of territory to the neighbouring country.
“The Prime Minister has denied that Chinese forces are inside our territory, but for some reason, our Army keeps talking to the Chinese about their entry into our territory, and our Chief of Army Staff has said that the Chinese are inside. This is a fact. This is not an invention.”
Rahul underlined that wars are fought not merely between armies and their weapons, but between industrial systems. Through his speech, the LoP said, he was attempting to offer to the people the President’s address that would have been delivered had the INDIA bloc been in power.
“The fact of the matter is that China has an industrial system that is far stronger, far bigger than our industrial system, and that is why they have the guts to come inside this country. The reason China is sitting inside this country is because Make in India has failed. The reason China is sitting inside this country is because India is refusing to produce, and I am worried that India is going to give up this revolution to the Chinese,” Rahul said.
The prime minister’s Make in India initiative was a “conceptually good idea” in the direction of strengthening manufacturing, he said.
“(But) the share of manufacturing fell from 15.3 percent of the GDP in 2014 to 12.6 percent of GDP today. That is the lowest share of manufacturing in 60 years. I am not even blaming the Prime Minister, because I think it would not be fair to say he didn’t try. I could say that the Prime Minister tried, and I think conceptually making India was a good idea, but it’s pretty clear that he failed,” Rahul said.
“We have excellent companies that try to organise production. They are the Mahindras of this world. They are the Bajajs of this world, part of Tata that organises production, but the record of the country in organising production is dismal. And, essentially what we have done is we have handed over the organisation of production to the Chinese.”
The primary message in the presidential address, he said, ought to have been on production.
“If we continue to focus only on consumption, we will find that we will run huge deficits, we will increase inequality, and eventually we will run into a serious social problem because of unemployment, which we are already facing,” he said.
Rahul also suggested that India leverage its strategic partnership with the US to build a robust industrial system.
“Please understand that India is as important as the United States for the simple reason that they cannot build an industrial system without us. They cannot build a production system without us. No matter what they say, the Americans simply cannot do what India can do, because their cost structure is much, much, much more expensive than ours. We can build things that the Americans would never imagine. India can do that,” he said.
“Our foreign policy would take into account this revolution. When we talk to the United States, we would not send our foreign minister to invite our prime minister to his coronation. We will not send him three or four times. Please invite our prime minister. Because if we had a production system and if we were working on these technologies, the American president would come here and invite the Prime Minister,” Rahul asserted.
His remarks drew a pushback from the treasury benches, where Modi was also seated. Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju said Rahul had no business making “unsubstantiated claims”. Speaker Om Birla also asked Rahul to back his allegations with facts.
Apart from production, India also needs to invest in getting a hold over the data that comes out during the process to ride the AI revolution sweeping the globe, Rahul said, contending that AI is meaningless without data. Rahul argued that India currently does not have either consumption or production data, which, he said, were being controlled by the Americans and the Chinese respectively.
“China has at least a 10 year lead on India. China has been working on batteries, robots, motors, optics for the last 10 years, and we are behind. So what would our President’s address say to the youngsters? We will choose critical areas in each one of these technologies, and we will start to build capabilities in those areas,” he said.
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Caste census & Maharashtra polls
Apart from manufacturing, defence and foreign policy, in his speech, the LoP also touched on his pet themes of caste census, Constitution, while reiterating his suspicion that the Maharashtra polls may have been compromised.
Referring to the figures thrown up by the caste survey in Telangana, Rahul said it had shown that 90 percent of the state’s population were made up of backward castes, scheduled castes, tribals and minorities.
He then spoke about his unwavering commitment to carry out a nation-wide case census, while asserting that he was absolutely convinced that the social break up in the rest of the country would be along the lines in Telangana.
“Now imagine the power of AI when we apply it to caste census. Imagine what we will do with AI, and what we will do with the social revolution in this country when we start to apply AI on the data that we get from the caste census. So we are going to run a parallel track. On one side, participation, revolutionising the participation of Dalits, OBCs, adivasis, in the ruling of this country, in the institutions of this country, in distribution of wealth of this country and on the other side parallel track, challenge the Chinese and participate in the revolution and defeat the Chinese in electric motors, batteries, solar panels and wind,” he said.
He reiterated his demand that the Election Commission (EC) share the complete details of electoral rolls in Maharashtra prepared during the assembly and Lok Sabha polls, alleging that during the intervening period the number of voters in the state had risen by 70 lakh “or the size of the population of Himachal Pradesh”.
The EC had previously countered the Congress’s claim in this regard, pointing out that there was a net addition of 40.81 lakh electors in the state during this period—48,81,620 additions and 8,00,391 deletions. Out of the total additions, 26,46,608 were young electors aged between 18-29, the EC had said, describing it as a welcome trend of participation of the youth.
Rahul said his concern regarding Maharashtra elections should not be seen in isolation.
“The Election Commissioner used to be chosen by the Prime Minister, the Leader of Opposition, and the Chief Justice. The Chief Justice was removed from that committee. Why? In a few days, I am going to go to the meeting. … There is going to be Mr. Amit Shah and Mr. Modi ji, and there is going to be two to one. Why am I even going to the meeting?” Rahul said.
(Edited by Tony Rai)
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