RSS men sitting in every ministry: Rahul Gandhi

Congress president Rahul Gandhi today accused the Narendra Modi government of "disrespecting" and "demolishing" various institutions by having RSS men "sitting in every ministry and giving orders."

Interacting with the city's traders here, Gandhi said if voted to power, the Congress would free these institutions from the RSS control.

"I don't know if you all know that in every single minister's office, there is an RSS man sitting and giving orders. So what can you expect... nothing but disrespecting the institutions. The banking system of the country has been demolished by having this structure," he said.

"Who is Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksey? These are the people who arise when you don't respect the financial institutions like the Reserve Bank of India."

"We are also seeing Piyush Goyal (with scam tumbling out)," he said.

Fugitive diamond merchant Modi and his uncle Choksey are at the centre of the Punjab National Bank fraud.

Gandhi had yesterday targeted Union Minister Piyush Goyal for his alleged links to the promoter of a company in default of Rs 650 crore.

Gandhi said former RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan had advised against demonetisation.

He claimed that the chief economic advisor, the Union finance minister and the entire Cabinet were unaware of the demonetisation plans of the Prime Minister.

"The entire cabinet was locked up prior to the demonetisation. They (Cabinet ministers) were not let out of the room," he alleged.

Asked how the Congress would solve the unemployment problem, Gandhi said it would do so by encouraging small and medium scale businesses in construction, agriculture and other sectors.

He also said China is successful in creating jobs because its government imparts skill training to its workforce.

"In Modiji's government, there is no talk on (imparting) skills," he said.

Gandhi said the banks should give loans also to small and medium scale entrepreneurs, but this benefit is being usurped by 15 big names in Indian business.

"Anil Ambani has Rs 45,000 crore of the loan and to help him, the Rafale (fighter jet) contract was given to him," he said.

In a letter to Congress leader Randeep Surjewala, Ambani, however, had refuted the allegation saying that Dassault's decision to choose Reliance as its joint venture partner was an independent agreement between the two corporate private sector entities and the two governments had nothing to do with it.