Rahul Gandhi describes note ban as a disaster, GST as a torpedo

New Delhi: Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi on Monday dubbed demonetisation as an "out and out disaster" and claimed that GST was a "torpedo" which destroyed the economy.

"The decision of demonetisation was an out-and-out disaster. The Prime Minister (Narendra Modi) is yet not able to understand the pain of the nation," Rahul Gandhi said after a meeting of party general secretaries here.

"I don't know what they are going to celebrate. November 8 is a sad day for us," he said referring to the government's decision to observe it as anti-black money day.

"Today we had two meetings, one on demonetisation and the other on GST. In the demonetisation meeting we discussed how the country has suffered a lot and many small businesses have closed," Gandhi said.

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"In the GST meeting, it was discussed how a good idea was destroyed," he said.

He said that Narendra Modi gave two shocks to the country "one after another".

"He gave two shocks one after another -- first demonetisation and the other GST," he said.

Demonetisation was the first torpedo from which the country survived, but the second torpedo of GST destroyed it, he added.

The Congress leader's remarks come a day after Prime Minister Modi said he was prepared to pay any price but would not roll back the reforms.

"The government would make changes to better the system, and whether we remain or not, we will not let the nation be ruined," Modi said. "There would be no rollback of the mega reform move," Modi said in Karnataka on Sunday.