By YP Rajesh and Krishna N. Das
NEW DELHI, Feb 10 (Reuters) - Indian Prime Minister
Narendra Modi’s enormous popularity remains intact despite the
biggest political attack on him in years as rivals accuse his
government of giving undue favours to the Adani Group, approval
ratings showed on Friday.
Opposition parties stalled parliament for three days since
last week and staged street protests demanding an investigation
into the business conglomerate founded by Gautam Adani, which
has lost more than $110 billion in market value after a scathing
report by a U.S. short seller on Jan. 24.
Ahead of a string of state elections this year and
general elections in early 2024, Congress and other opposition
parties have said Modi's government was trying to shield Adani
by refusing to grant the demand for a bipartisan investigation.
Without referring to Adani, Modi told parliament this week
that the "blessings of 1.4 billion people in the country are my
protective cover and you can't destroy it with lies and abuses",
as opposition lawmakers chanted "Adani, Adani".
Data from polling agency C-Voter, shared with Reuters, seems
to suggest support for the prime minister has not waned,
although the survey did not refer to the Adani issue.
Almost half of those surveyed until Feb. 5 were "very much
satisfied" with Modi’s work as prime minister and a further 30%
said they were "satisfied to some extent". Both ratings have
hovered around the same levels since Nov. 2022, the data showed.
In January, the Mood of the Nation opinion poll conducted by
C-Voter for India Today magazine twice a year, showed 72% of
respondents rated Modi’s performance as "good", up from 66% in
August last year.
But Modi has been facing sustained opposition fire since
U.S.-based Hindenburg Research accused the Adani Group of stock
manipulation and improper use of tax havens, while also saying
it had unsustainable debt.
The group denies the claims and has threatened legal action
against Hindenburg.
Senior ministers and top government officials have sought to
counter the opposition accusations by saying the crisis in the
Adani Group posed no risk to state-run companies and regulators
would look into any wrongdoing by it.
The issues raised by Hindenburg were corporate and not
political and should be treated as such, said Gopal Krishna
Agarwal, a spokesperson for Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
"Those who want to pursue the agenda of a short-seller are
free to do so," Agarwal told Reuters, referring to the
opposition.
"They only have one narrative and that is to bash
wealth-creators. There will be problems in the corporate sector.
Which economy doesn’t have problems and challenges?"
Rivals accuse Modi and the BJP of longstanding ties with the
apples-to-airports Adani Group, going back nearly two decades
when Modi was chief minister of the western state of Gujarat.
Both Gautam Adani - who was the world’s third richest person
until the stock rout and is now ranked 21, according to Forbes -
and Modi come from the coastal state.
Congress has questioned investments made by state-run firms
in Adani companies and the handover of the management of six
airports to the group in recent years, even though it had no
experience in the sector.
Adani denies the charges while Law Minister Kiren Rijiju on
Wednesday called them "wild allegations".
(Editing by Clarence Fernandez)
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