New Delhi : Hitting out at Subramanian Swamy for targeting technocrats appointed by the government, Former Infosys Director T.V. Mohandas Pai on Wednesday called on Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Finance Minister Arun Jaitley to show the senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader his place, or end up with no outsider or experts wanting to work for the Indian government.
Speaking to ANI here, Pai asserted that it was unprecedented that a government minister was targeting the very people appointed for a certain purpose by the nation’s decision making authorities.
“The government has a prerogative to appoint people at a senior post. If they don’t want someone there, they must talk to them quietly and tell them that they want someone else and should resign. Nobody will hang on. They have all been appointed by the government for a particular term. They are not permanent bureaucracy, they are technocrats,” Pai said.
Hitting out at Swamy for going after Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Raghuram Rajan and Chief Economic Advisor Arvind Subramanian, he added that the situation had turned dangerous as people had begun questioning as to who was actually running the country.
“All of us respect PM Modi and Finance Minister Jaitley, but people in the country and outside are asking who is running India. Is Swamy the super person influencing policy? Is Swamy the decision making authority? What is happening in this country? In no other country have we seen such things happening,” he said.
“It is very important now that the PM and the FM put their foot down and tell Swamy where he gets off. If Swamy has some evidence then he can talk to people in the party and they can take a call then. They can do what they want but should do it quietly,” Pai added.
Asserting that nobody can question the Prime Minister or the Finance Minister as they are the right authorities, Pai also stated that decisions need to be made carefully or the people from outside will have issues in working with the Government of India.
“Why will people who are not in the bureaucracy work with the Government? The bureaucracy does not have the confidence or the capability to run the country. We need experts from outside. Next, Swamy may go after Dr. Arvind Panagariya, he can go after anybody,” Pai added.
Earlier in the day, Swamy demanded that Arvind Subramanian be sacked, as he had badmouthed India in the international arena and had also encouraged the grand old party to become rigid on their GST Bill clauses.
Speaking to ANI here after he tweeted against Arvind, Swamy reiterated his salvo he had used against RBI Chief Raghuram Rajan, saying that the CEA was a ‘green card holder’ and was probably not an Indian citizen.
“He used to work in America and he is also a green card holder type. I don’t even know if he is a citizen or not but I’m sure he has a green card. There was this American Congress Committee for pharmaceutical purposes and they held a hearing to figure out India’s opinion on the matter. There he said in a statement that India was not working according to America in this matter and for that, they should be taught a lesson in WTO. How can we can such a person an advisor here?,” Swamy said.
Continuing his assault, he added that when Arvind was appointed by the Indian government, he gave a note to the Finance Ministry asserting that the clauses given by the Congress in the GST Bill were absolutely justified.
“I think that such people who can fail our government should be tossed out. Now, it’s been two years and I think it’s about time. I have a list of 27 people in the government and I will slowly, one by one, fix them soon,” he added.
This development comes days after Swamy announced that his next ‘project’ is to expose a group of bureaucrats loyal to Congress Chief Sonia Gandhi.
“My next project is to expose 27 bureaucrats who are in various Ministries and loyal to TDK. They were handpicked and positioned by PC,” Swamy said in a tweet.
Earlier, Swamy had welcome Rajan’s decision to leave his post as the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor on the completion of his term, saying that he had taken such a step in order to save his ‘self respect’.
Rajan had earlier announced that he would return to the academic world at the end of his term on September 4, 2016, adding he will always be available to serve his country when needed and asserted that his ‘successor’ would take the nation to new heights. (ANI)