New Delhi, Dec 1 (IANS): In a scathing attack on Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, senior BJP leader Subramanian Swamy has said, "she doesn't know economics".

Swamy's attack comes at a time when Sitharaman is defending the Modi government's economic policies and denying that there is a slowdown in the economy.

In a recent interview, Swamy said, "If you see the press conferences, she is handing the mic to civil servants to answer."

"What is the problem in the country today? Poor demand. Supply is not the problem. But what did she do? She relaxes taxes for corporates. Corporates are flushed with supply. They will just use it," Swamy said.

Part of the problem, Swamy said in the interview was that Prime Minister Narendra Modi's advisors were too afraid to tell him the truth.

"The Prime minister knows nothing about it. He is being told ‘wonderful growth rate'," Swamy said.

Swamy has been positioning himself for the FM's post and had earlier been critical of Arun Jaitley also, but has been overlooked for the job.

"He doesn't want me," Swamy said about PM Modi. "He doesn't want any minister to talk back to him, let alone in public, but in private cabinet meetings too."

"If you look at the economy with a discerning eye, you see that growth may have come down," Sitharaman said in the Rajya Sabha on November 27.

"But it is not a recession yet and won't be a recession ever."

Swamy, however, slammed the growth figures and put out numbers closer to 1.5 per cent. said, "Do you know what the real growth rate today is? They are saying that it is coming down to 4.8%. I'm saying it is 1.5 per cent", Swamy said in the interview.

Swamy's Twitter account is full of tweets and articles which remind everyone that only he had warned of the economy going into a tailspin as early as 2015, four years back.