CLAIM
A Facebook post has gone viral on Wednesday, 27 March, which says that in 2014, the Congress did not have money to buy weapons for the Armed Forces, but now, in 2019, they are making promises about giving Rs 72,000 per month.
The post is by a Facebook page called Achhe Din, and at the time this story was published, it had over 2K reactions and over 1.4K shares, within an hour of it being uploaded on the social media platform.
The text accompanying the photo says: मेरा जूता कहां है? (Where is my shoe?)
TRUE OR FALSE?
Not Enough Money
The post makes two claims. The first is that the Congress government had no money to procure weapons for the Armed Forces in 2014.
This part of the post is true.
In February 2014, when the UPA government was in power, the then defence minister AK Anthony had said that his ministry had used up 92 percent of the defence budget and major acquisitions may have to wait till the next fiscal year.
“There is no money left. All major projects have to wait till 1 April,” Antony said, reported The Indian Express.
This was one reason why India was not able to sign a $20 billion deal to acquire Rafale jets at that time. The decision to buy 126 Rafale jets had been taken in January 2012.
Talking about the medium multi-role combat aircraft (MMRCA) deal, the defence minister said there was a “delay” but “negotiations are going on, because of shortage of funds, the deal will finalise in the next financial year”, according to the report.
Rs 72,000 Per Month
However, the second part, which says that the Congress is now promising Rs 72,000 per month, is false.
The post is ostensibly referring to the NYAY scheme. According to the NYAY scheme, announced by Rahul Gandhi on Monday, 25 March, the government would be giving Rs 72,000 per year to each family.
As can be heard in the above video, under the NYAY scheme, the minimum income line is drawn at Rs 12,000 per month. The difference between a family's income and the line (Rs 12,000) will be paid out by the government. He goes on to give the example that if the income is Rs 6,000, then the government will give the family Rs 6,000 per month to 'top up' the difference.
At the two minute mark in the video, Gandhi says that 20 percent of the poorest families in India will be given Rs 72,000 each year, transferred to their bank accounts.
Congress leader P Chidambaram also tweeted about the scheme, saying the same thing.
However, after some confusion regarding Gandhi’s explanation of the top-up part of the scheme, Congress spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewala said that all poor families would receive Rs 72,000 per year.
(With inputs from The Indian Express.)