As Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi questioned investments in Uttarakhand following the Global Investors Summit organised in 2023; the Dehradun Police registered a First Information Report (FIR) against a user of the social media platform X and others for allegedly spreading misinformation.
The FIR was registered under sections 66-C and 66-D of the Information Technology Act at the Rajpur police station, naming the account holder, Kamran (@CitizenKamran), and others, on the basis of a complaint lodged by Additional Director of Industries, Mritunjay Singh.
Singh stated in his complaint that the state government organised the Global Investors Summit 2023 to foster economic development, attract investments, and generate employment in Uttarakhand, and has been continuously working to promote an investor-friendly environment.
"False, misleading, and baseless content is being disseminated on X and other social media platforms by the account @CitizenKamran and others. This is being done to create distrust among investors and adversely affect the investment climate in the state," the complaint read.
Rajpur Police Station In-charge PD Bhatt said, "We have registered the FIR (on October 17), and an investigation into the matter is underway."
Rahul Gandhi's charge
On Sunday, Congress leader and Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi targeted the Pushkar Singh Dhami-led BJP government over the summit.
"The Dhami government’s claims of investment in Uttarakhand are a complete sham and yet another example of the BJP's hollow 'double engine' model," Gandhi said.
He said that the Global Investors Summit was trumpeted with great fanfare, claiming that 1,779 MoUs were signed and that investment proposals worth ₹3.56 lakh crore were made. Nearly ₹100 crore of public money was spent on national and international roadshows before the state government declared that ₹1 lakh crore in investments had already grounded.
Citing a media report, Gandhi alleged that the Dhami government inflated its investment figures by misrepresenting local flour mills, fertiliser shops, and neighbourhood clinics as major "investors", often without the owners' knowledge.
He further said that over 35% of the claimed "grounded investment" ( ₹35,279 crore) was merely repackaged public funds from state-owned power utilities; a charitable school funded by CSR was credited with bringing in ₹24.49 crore of "industrial investment", a firm promising ₹1,200 crore had zero revenue and zero employees on record, and lavish international roadshows in Dubai and London yielded no actual grounded investments.
"To cover up these gaps, the state government altered the official definition of 'investment' on December 1, 2023, just seven days before the summit. Change the rules first, fabricate the numbers later," Gandhi said.
"Investments exist only on paper, employment only in slogans, and for the youth of Uttarakhand, only the bitter reality of recruitment paper leaks," he added.