Agriculture Minister Jitu Vaghani on Thursday accused the Opposition Congress of “misleading the public” on the debt of Gujarat pointing out that the state’s debt-to-GSDP ratio is as low as 18.2 per cent, much lower than the prescribed 27 per cent.He was speaking during the general debate on the budget for the year 2026-27 in the Gujarat Legislative Assembly. The Congress had earlier targeted the ruling BJP on the “mounting debt” of the state.“Whenever it comes to debt, the Congress misleads the public. Huge capital is needed for major projects like highways, bridges, Narmada dams and hospitals. In the year 2001-02, the size of the state budget was only Rs 36,000 crore, which has increased by 1100 per cent to Rs 4,08,053 crore today. Similarly, the per capita income of the state has also increased from Rs 19,713 to Rs 3,01,000, which is 60 per cent more than the national average. Today, Gujarat’s contribution to the country’s GDP is 8.2 per cent,” the minister, who is also state government spokesperson, said.Hitting out at the opposition and comparing Gujarat’s Debt-to-GSDP with Punjab, Vaghani said that Gujarat is at the top in fiscal discipline today. “Gujarat’s Debt-to-GSDP ratio is as low as 18.2 per cent, which is much lower than the prescribed 27 per cent, while the Debt-to-GSDP ratio in opposition-ruled Punjab is 47 per cent and in Himachal Pradesh is 45 per cent. Gujarat gets loans only because its GSDP is healthy, no one lends money to a beggar. According to the NCAER report, Gujarat is the best in the country in reducing its debt ratio in the last 10 years,” he said, targeting both the Congress and AAP.In his further comparisons, Vaghani cited the ‘Fiscal Health Index-2025’ of the NITI Aayog and said that Gujarat is in the “Achiever” category, which is the first category. On the other hand, opposition-ruled states like Punjab, Kerala and West Bengal are in the last ‘Aspirational’ category in financial management. Earlier during the Congress rule, the budget was always in deficit, but today Gujarat has become a state with a revenue surplus of Rs 25,586 crore, he pointed out.During the Congress era, budgets were just a web of statistics, in which there was no integrated framework for development, the minister alleged. “The Congress governments had turned the country’s economy into a ‘disaster’. They did not even give stale roses to the public. But some leaders themselves wore fresh flowers and ironed clothes from Paris every day,” he alleged.Targeting the Congress, Vaghani said that when the 26/11 attack took place in Mumbai 17 years ago, the Congress government only sent dossiers and accepted surrender. “The (then) Home Minister of the UPA government had admitted that the Army was ready, but the government stopped it from attacking (Pakistan). Today, if any terrorist raises his eyes against the new India under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, our Army enters the house and eliminates him, which the world has seen in Operation Sindoor. This is the difference between the helpless Congress government and the strong BJP government,” he said.Story continues below this adHe further added that the Congress deprived Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel of the Bharat Ratna for 41 years and kept the Narmada project on hold for decades, due to which the cost of the project increased from Rs. 6,000 crore to Rs. 56,286 crore, the people of Gujarat have paid the price for this “economic sin”, he said. Gujarat has become a ‘Policy Driven State’ today, he said. “The state has become a manufacturing hub through many modern policies like semiconductor, IT, biotechnology and renewable energy. Farmers no longer have to work at night, they get electricity during the day with the ‘Kisan Suryodaya Yojana’. In the current Rabi season, farmers of the state have sown a record 44 lakh hectares,” he added.“The definition of development that the then Chief Minister Narendra Modi gave in the same House in the year 2006-07, ‘development should not be in pieces, but continuous’, is proving true today. Today, there is political stability in Gujarat and the decisive government is doing the work of public welfare,” he added.