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Journalism of Courage
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday said that she “found it a bit rich” when the Opposition questioned the government’s handling of the economy, as late Arun Jaitley, her predecessor, had inherited an economy that was “counted in the fragile five”.
Replying in Rajya Sabha on the Finance Bill, 2021, a day after it was passed in Lok Sabha, Sitharaman said, “India became one of the fastest growing economies and that is entirely to the credit of Shri Arun Jaitley-ji and Pradhanmantri-ji.”
With it being a money Bill, the Finance Bill was sent back to Lok Sabha after a discussion that lasted close to seven hours on Wednesday.
Sitharaman said, “I find it a bit rich when opponents tell us you are not managing the economy all right; you don’t have expertise. When my late predecessor Shri Arun Jaitley was Finance Minister, it was referred quite often of what he had inherited as an economy. India was one of the fragile five economies. That was what he inherited. What did he make of it?”
She used statistics to argue that the NDA had performed better than the 10 years of the Congress-led UPA government between 2004 and 2014.
