Among the several issues that Rahul Gandhi, Congress Party President has lied about repeatedly, one of them was always the Goods and Service Tax (GST). The GST was perhaps one of the most large-scale tax reforms that a country, the size of India, had ever undertaken. GST unified taxes levied on goods and services.
The Modi government managed to get the consent of all parties, including Congress, before notifying the GST and has since been tweaking the products under various slabs to ensure consumers can extract maximum benefit.
However, Rahul Gandhi has been constantly referring to the GST as “Gabbar Singh Tax”. He has asserted in the past that the tax slabs are too high and that the government is almost indulging in extortionist tactics.
He had made the asinine demand of every product being taxed at 18%. This would essentially mean that essential goods and luxury cars would be taxed at the same rate.
The Modi government today did the more prudent thing by shifting several items from the higher tax slab of 28% to the 18% GST slab or lower. Now, only 28 luxury items, also called sin goods, remain in the 28% category.
This was another promise delivered by the Modi government. Just 4 days ago, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had asserted that soon, 99% of Goods and Services would be brought under the 18% GST slab or lower.
However, while the country celebrated this move which would prove to be a massive relief for the consumers and especially the middle class, Rahul Gandhi’s Congress was reportedly singing a different tune.
According to a media report, during the GST council meet today, Congress opposed Modi government’s move to reduce the GST rates on several items.
A portal called BTVI News reported that officials from Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chattisgarh, states that have just been wrested from BJP by the Congress, opposed the GST rate cut because they viewed it as a political move.
This reminds one of another analogy. Rahul Gandhi has been temple-hopping for some time now in a bid to wash away his anti-Hindu image. While he has been indulging in his pseudo-Hindutva, senior Congress leaders had gone to the Supreme Court and asserted that the Ram Mandir verdict should be delayed and delivered only after 2019 because a verdict now could influence 2019 elections. Basically, they feared that if a Ram Temple was built in Ayodhya, Hindus would rally behind Narendra Modi in 2019.
Just like Rahul Gandhi was ready to sacrifice the building of Ram Mandir due to political considerations, after screaming about how the Modi government should reduce GST rates, his governments from 3 states have today shamelessly opposed the GST rate cut which would benefit the middle class.
Union Minister Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore too took to Twitter and reacted to Rahul Gandhi’s hypocrisy.
घर से निकलते ही…
कुछ दूर चलते ही… pic.twitter.com/6ISBZYNr9E— Rajyavardhan Rathore (@Ra_THORe) December 22, 2018
Others commented on how his stands change before and after elections.
Pic 1: Before election
Pic 2: After election pic.twitter.com/qYdTIwculO— Aashish Chandorkar (@c_aashish) December 22, 2018
Rahul Gandhi has displayed his hypocrisy on several issues that matter. This seems to be just another case.
