The Bharatiya Janata Party on Thursday claimed that the data on unemployment that was made public earlier in the day was fake news. A report in Business Standard had said that the National Sample Survey Office’s Periodic Labour Force Survey recorded the unemployment rate in India at a 45-year-high of 6.1% in 2017-’18.

The saffron party also criticised Congress President Rahul Gandhi, who mocked the Centre over the data. “The Fuhrer promised us 2 crore jobs a year,” Gandhi tweeted. “Five years later, his leaked job creation report card reveals a national disaster.” The Fuhrer was another title used for former dictator and Nazi Party chief Adolf Hitler. “Unemployment is the highest in 45 years,” Gandhi said. “6.5 crore youth were jobless in 2017-’18 alone. Time for NoMo2Go.”

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Responding to Gandhi’s tweets, the BJP claimed Gandhi had inherited fascist dictator Benito Mussolini’s “shortsightedness”. The party claimed data from the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation showed an increase in jobs in the last 15 months.

“It’s clear that he has inherited Mussolini’s shortsightedness and has myopic understanding of issues,” the BJP said on Twitter. “EPFO’s real data shows sharp increase in jobs, created in just the last 15 months. Only a man who hasn’t ever held a proper job and is totally jobless can peddle such fake news!”

Two independent members of the National Statistical Commission had resigned this week after the government allegedly failed to publish the report that was prepared last month. The report has still not been made public.

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The survey is the first on employment made by a government agency since demonetisation. The Periodic Labour Force Survey is also the first annual household survey of the National Sample Survey Office. Its data was collected between July 2017 and June 2018.

Documents reviewed by the Business Standard showed that unemployment rate was at its highest since the 1972-’73 period, from when the employment data is comparable. In comparison, the unemployment rate stood at 2.2% in 2011-’12, during the United Progressive Alliance’s second term, according to the survey.