Rahul Gandhi queues up outside SBI Bank in Delhi

As people across the nation thronged to ATM counters, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi queued outside an SBI in New Delhi on Friday. News agency ANI reported that the Gandhi scion had lined up outside an SBI in Parliament Street.

“Gareeb vyakti ko kasht ho raha hai, mai yahan Rs 4000 badalne aaya hoon(Poor people are in trouble, I am here to get Rs 4, 000 exchanged,” he said to the reporters. “Neither you (reporters) nor your crorepati owners nor the Prime Minister will understand the problems faced by people.”

Crowds at the Parliament Street bank were in for a surprise when the 46-year-old leader joined the queue to exchange demonetised currency notes with new ones. Crowds jostled to get a selfie with Gandhi who said that he was there because his people were suffering due to the demonetisation.

“Kya apko yaha koi suit boot pehne dikh raha hai, yaha par sab aam log hai jo pareshan hai, par Modi ji ko isse kya farak padta hai. (Can you see anybody here who is high and mighty? Only the troubled common people are here. But how does it matter to Modiji?)” he said.

According to PTI, Gandhi also interacted with people standing in queue and listened to their troubles. The huge crowd in the bank, that was trying to exchange old notes, faced inconveniences as he had reached there. During the 40 minutes of his stay at the venue, many bank staffers were seen clicking pictures of Gandhi.

The Congress vice-president had earlier criticised the government’s demonetisation move on Twitter saying that the “real culprits” who had stashed “black money” were “sitting tight” as the farmers, small shopkeepers and housewives faced troubles.

“Once again Mr Modi shows how little he cares about ordinary people of this country — farmers, small shop-keepers, housewives — all thrown into utter chaos,” he tweeted. Gandhi also asked, “One question for the PM: How is replacing 1,000 rupee notes with 2,000 rupee notes going to make black money hoarding a lot harder?”