Describing demonetisation as the “biggest scam”, the Congress on Thursday accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of misleading the people, saying he had repeatedly made “false statements” on what the decision to junk high-value currency notes had achieved.

These remarks by senior Congress leader Anand Sharma come in the wake of the RBI's annual report on Wednesday that revealed that Rs 15.28 lakh crore of high-value currency notes had returned to the system by way of public deposits – in short, that the experiment had been a failure.

The Prime Minister, Sharma stressed, owed the nation an explanation. “He has to accept moral responsibility. He must apologise to the country and we will continue to force accountability on this issue,” he said.

Pointing to the Prime Minister’s Independence Day speech about the quantum of black money unearthed after 86.4% of India’s currency, totalling almost 15.5 lakh crore in Rs. 500 and Rs. 1000 notes, was scrapped on November 8 last year, Sharma said demonetisation had led to a loss of GDP of Rs 2.25 lakh crore.

“The government has not spoken the truth at any stage. People have been misled, inconvenienced. This has been the biggest scam,” Mr. Sharma said, stressing, “Those who had illegal money, the government has helped them make it legal.”

Saying that all the reasons the Prime Minister had given for demonetisation – that it would end corruption, black money and terror funding – have proved to be false, he stressed that demonetisation had instead “inflicted misery upon the people of India, wrecked the country’s economy, shaved off 1.5% of India’s GDP which was equivalent to 2.25 lakh crore”. Tens of millions of jobs were lost in the unorganised sector, crores of Indian citizens had to stand in front of banks and ATMs, more than 100 persons died and dozens committed suicide, he continued.