Pathankot, Jan 25: Senior BJP leader Arun Jaitley on Tuesday alleged the Salman Rushdie controversy was generated by the Congress to tap Muslim votes in five poll-bound states.
The Congress-led government at the Centre “seems to be playing into the hands of fundamentalist forces and it has created the controversy to gain Muslim votes in the wake of assembly polls in five states,” he told an election rally here.
Jaitley said the Congress had played a “questionable role” in the entire episode.
Criticising the Centre's policies, Jaitley accused the UPA government of failing to provide “much-needed” fillip to the country's economy.
“The UPA government seems to be suffering from policy paralysis and as a result has failed to provide much-needed boost to the country's economy,” said Jaitley.
He claimed Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had failed to address the problems facing the Indian economy and as a result of the Centre's “muddled policies” Foreign Direct Investment was at its lowest ebb.
“Even the inflationary trend has not been curbed, which shows that nothing seems to be working rights with the government's decision making,” he said.
