Rahul Gandhi Points Finger at Top BJP Leaders After Market Crash

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi has sparked a political storm by accusing Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah of orchestrating what he calls the 'biggest stock market scam' in India's history. His claims center on a sharp rise and then a sudden collapse in the Indian stock market around the 2024 Lok Sabha election results, events he says were influenced directly by comments from the country’s highest political offices.

In a series of statements, Gandhi outlined a clear timeline: On May 13, Amit Shah told investors in a media interview to "buy stocks before June 4." A week later, PM Modi, during a campaign rally, confidently predicted record stock market highs on June 4. These suggestions weren’t merely ignored; instead, they sparked widespread optimism, especially after a round of exit polls on June 1 that pointed to a sweeping BJP victory. As a result, the Sensex and Nifty surged to all-time highs on June 3, just a day before vote counts were to be announced.

But the story quickly took a dark turn. On June 4, as the actual election results were revealed, the markets crashed. Gandhi claims this dramatic turn wiped out nearly ₹30 lakh crore of value, hammering retail investors who had pumped money into the market, believing in the rosy picture painted by top BJP leaders. According to him, this can't be dismissed as a mere coincidence.

Demand for Joint Parliamentary Committee Investigation and Mixed Political Reactions

What really raises eyebrows is the timing and content of those public statements. Gandhi questions why the Prime Minister and the Home Minister, who are not financial experts or regulators, were making bold market predictions during an election campaign. He says this unusual behavior draws suspicion—was it a coordinated effort to channel money into the market before a planned crash that benefited a select few? He wants a full-blown Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) probe into this alleged Stock Market Scam, arguing it’s the only way to unravel who really profited and how ordinary investors were left in the dust.

The BJP, however, isn’t holding back in its response. Union Minister Piyush Goyal called Gandhi’s allegations nothing more than an attempt to deflect attention from the Congress Party’s poor performance in the elections. According to BJP leaders, the market’s shifts had nothing to do with political speeches, and they dismissed the talk of a scam as post-poll blame games.

What complicates matters further is that regulatory bodies like SEBI, which usually watch for unusual trading patterns, have not yet announced any formal investigation into the market slump. Government sources say that, if any actual wrongdoing is detected, normal procedures will kick in. But to many outside observers, the silence or slow response from regulators only fuels speculation that the matter needs an impartial, wide-reaching probe—exactly what the Congress is pushing for in the aftermath of this high-stakes financial drama.