Modi's guarantee a jumla, youth going to Israel for jobs: Priyanka Gandhi Vadra

Hitting out at the Narendra Modi government at the Centre over people seeking jobs in Israel, Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra said on 30 January that talk of our US$ 5 trillion economy and 'Modi ka guarantee' are just a "jumla", with the real issue in the country being that unemployment and inflation are rife, for which the BJP government has no solution.

The Congress general secretary shared a video on X that showed people queuing up for a recruitment drive to send workers to Israel.

In her post, in Hindi, Gandhi Vadra said, "If there is a war situation anywhere, then first of all we rescue our citizens from there and bring them back to our country.

"But today unemployment has resulted in such a situation that the government is not even saving thousands of helpless youth from taking the risk of going to war-torn Israel."

"This shows that talk of things like 'USD 5 trillion economy', '2 crore jobs annually' and 'Modi's guarantee' during elections are just jumla [rhetoric]," she said.

Why are the youth not getting employment in their own country, the Indian National Congress general secretary wondered.

"Are these youth standing in long queues for two days not the children of our country that we are happily ready to send them into the middle of such a terrible war?" Gandhi Vadra asked.

Notice how cleverly the government is making this out to be the 'personal choice' of youth citizens, she added.

"What is the role of government in this? On what basis has the Government of India given permission to war-torn Israel to sacrifice Indian youth? Who will take the responsibility of protecting the life and property of these youth of ours? God forbid, if an incident happens to someone, who is to be held responsible?" the Congress leader asked.

The real issues of India today are unemployment and inflation and the BJP government has no solution to it, Gandhi Vadra said. The youth of the country too now understand this, she added.

The Congress had on Saturday, 27 January, slammed the government over people reportedly queuing up in Uttar Pradesh and Haryana for jobs in Israel, saying it was a reflection of the "grim unemployment situation" in the country and makes a "mockery" of the claims of a booming economy.

The Congress has been consistently criticising the government over its handling of the economy and raising concerns over the increasing rates of unemployment and rising prices.

Alleging that more than 9 lakh posts are "lying vacant" in various departments of the central government, Indian Youth Congress national president Srinivas B.V. said on Tuesday, 30 January, that "no steps have been taken" by the ruling dispensation to fill those posts.

Referring to an RTI report, Srinivas claimed that a large number of posts are vacant in the railways, home department, civil defence, ministry of external Affairs, agriculture department, and sports and youth affairs.

Based on PTI inputs