Fugitive economic offenders like Vijay Mallya, Nirav Modi, and Sanjay Bhandari will be extradited to India, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on February 9, even as she charged the former Congress chief Sonia Gandhi of being a ‘Super Prime Minister’ in the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) years, blaming “rudderless” leadership for the “one big-ticket scam a year” decade between 2004-2014.
Speaking on the White Paper on the Economy in the Lok Sabha, the Minister said it was a serious document tabled with responsibility as it impacted the lives of people and shall serve as a record for posterity. “…Entire India’s youth should know what effort it took for a Prime Minister with a vision to restore India to its glory,” Ms. Sitharaman said, comparing the Commonwealth Games “flop show” to the “grand” success of G-20 events.
In her opening remarks, she went beyond the UPA decade to remind the House about the LIC of India being forced to invest in an ailing West Bengal firm run by Haridas Mundhra in the 1950s, which culminated in the then Finance Minister T.T. Krishnamachari’s resignation as “a sacrificial lamb”. She also talked about former State Bank of India chairman R.K. Talwar being forced out of office in 1976 when he refused to grant a particular loan to someone close to the government of the day.
