‘He’s entitled to belittle his own country…’: Union Minister Piyush Goyal on Rahul Gandhi

WASHINGTON: Union Minister of Commerce and Industry, Piyush Goyal, said that he sympathises with the lack of knowledge Congress leader and the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, has about the “manufacturing story” and said that he doesn’t know about the job losses that he has been talking about.

Speaking at a press conference on Friday during his visit to the US, Goyal said that it was a matter of choice for the Congress leader to “belittle his own country” and that it would not be appropriate to bring domestic politics to the foreign lands.

“I can only sympathise for the lack of knowledge about the manufacturing story because I don’t know which are those job losses he’s (Rahul Gandhi) talking about. But we are on foreign soil. We don’t like bringing domestic politics to foreign lands. He is entitled to belittle his own country; that’s a matter of his choice”, he said.

#WATCH | Washington DC: Union Minister Piyush Goyal says, “I can only sympathize for the lack of knowledge about the manufacturing story because I don’t know which are those job losses he’s (Rahul Gandhi) talking about. But we are foreign soil. We dont like bringing domestic… pic.twitter.com/mOS4o5cWsZ

— ANI (@ANI) October 4, 2024

“All of India is united in its effort to improve the prosperity of our people. We are all working towards a developed nation, a prosperous nation by 2047… We are all together in making the lives of the people of India better in the years to come”, Goyal added.

The Minister also criticised those who felt were responsible for allowing China’s influence on the Indian market to grow. He said that the US had also shown concern about the security threats from Chinese goods. “The whole world today recognises that China is a non-transparent and opaque economy. China is known to dump goods. Even the US is concerned about it… The US is concerned about security threats from Chinese goods and is imposing restrictions”, he said.

Taking a dig at the then UPA government, he reiterated that it was “a matter of shame” for India that between 2004 and 2014 Chinese goods had flooded the Indian market increasing the trade deficit with China nearly 30 times from $1.8 billion to $43 billion.

“India had a trade deficit of about $1.8 billion in 2004 with China… But between 2004 and 2014, our trade deficit went up from $1.8 billion to $43 billion in ten years by nearly 30 times. It is a matter of shame that we allowed Chinese goods to flood the Indian markets, to kill Indian manufacturing, to almost get investors disinterested in India’s story because there was no protection against these kinds of goods coming in from China”, Goyal added. (ANI)