Cong throws a challenge to Modi: Debate Gujarat model

Jul 26, 2013 |

Age Correspondent

Rubbishing Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi’s criticism of the UPA for the current economic slowdown, the Congress on Thursday dared him to join an open debate on his “Gujarat model” of development, which has failed to achieve anything substantial on social indicators.

Launching a scathing attack on the Bharatiya Janata Party and its chief campaigner for 2014, minister of state for information and broadcasting Manish Tewari, wondering about the Opposition’s “quibble” over poverty rate falling, said: “The Gujarat chief minister is in the habit of making one statement or the other daily... If he is so confident of the Gujarat governance model, he should come and debate it with us any day, in a place and format of his choice. It will be crystal clear how much strength that governance model has... The people of the country will judge. They will be able to sift fact from fiction.”
Mr Manish Tewari’s reaction came a day after the Gujarat chief minister alleged lack of leadership and policy paralysis in the UPA was responsible for the sorry state of the economy.
When asked if he was also challenging Mr Modi to a debate on human rights violations in Gujarat, the minister said this was “something so open” that there was no need for a debate on it.

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