‘PM’s China visit had hidden agenda’

Congress President Rahul Gandhi reacted angrily on Friday to the Modi government stalling recruitment of soldiers for the new Mountain Strike Corps along the China border by the Congress-led UPA government in 2013, with an excuse of “financial constraints.”

He said: “This is BJP nationalism on full display.” The government, however, insisted that the decision stems from its efforts to make the best use of the available funds for defence purposes.

“Our PM’s ‘no agenda’ China visit clearly had a ‘’Chinese hidden agenda’’ which is now unravelling,” Rahul tweeted referring to Narendra Modi’s trip in April for an informal meeting with President Xi Jinping.

“Never before in India’s history has a PM capitulated to pressure from a foreign power, as this one has,” Rahul said.

Congress chief spokesman Randeep Singh Surjewala also tweeted that “Govt endangers national security by putting it in cold storage.”

He pointed out that the Congress-UPA govt had approved raising of ‘Mountain Strike Corps’ along the China border with 90,274 additional soldiers at a cost of Rs 64,678 crore which has been now scrapped.

The Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) approved raising of the corps in 2013 when AK Antony was the defence minister. It was, in fact, an idea that was in work for years before a formal decision was taken.