Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited his parliamentary constituency Varanasi on Thursday to lay the foundation stone of a cancer institute. Though he preferred to maintain silence and stay absent during much of the winter session of the parliament, his speech at Benaras Hindu University (BHU) this morning was literally a jibe-fest against detractors of demonetisation. In an hour long speech, PM Modi was scathing about Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi, former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and former Finance Minister P Chidambaram.

Responding to the corruption allegations made by RaGa yesterday in Gujarat, PM Modi laughed it off mocking his oratory skills. He said he was happy to see the young leader learn the ‘art of speaking’. A ‘packet’ is what he called him. He said “In 2009, you couldn’t even tell what is inside this packet. Now we are finding out.”

To add to that, he took a jibe at the ‘earthquake’ alert issued by Mr. Gandhi. He said “If he didn’t speak, apparently the country would have to live through a terrible earthquake and would take us 10 years to recover from it. Well, thank god he started speaking, now we know that there’s no danger of any earthquake”.

Addressing a rally in Gujarat yesterday, RaGa had claimed that PM Modi received kickbacks from corporates in his tenure as the Chief Minister of Gujarat. He said “As per record with I-T, Rs 2.5 crore was given to PM Modi on 30 Oct 2013; Rs 5 crore on 12 November 2013; Rs 2.5 crore on 27 November 2013; Rs 5 crore on 29 November 2013”.

While Manmohan Singh took on Modi and his demonetisation move during the winter session of the parliament, PM Modi lashed out against the former prime minister. He said that India’s poverty was not his but the Congress’ doing. “I want to tell Mr Singh the fact that 50 percent of India is poor, is not my doing”, he said. He attacked the former finance minister Chidambaram saying that his government was bearing the burden of the policies framed by the Congress government. “I’m sorry to say my govt is burdened with legacy of your policies”.

In this round, looks like PM Modi did take down the Congress and the opposition. However, what we would like to ask our beloved Pradhan Mantri, or the ‘Pradhan Sevak’ as he likes to address himself, how long will the janta have to wait to be relieved from ‘notebandi’ ?