Rahul lying on jet price, UPA Govt cancelled deal after Vadra-linked firm was not picked as broker, alleges BJP

Even as Congress president Rahul Gandhi renewed his attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the Rafale deal, a delegation of senior Congress leaders met the Central Vigilance Commissioner (CVC) on Monday and sought registration of a case and a probe in the fighter jet deal.

The meeting comes days after a Congress delegation met the CAG and urged the apex auditor to prepare a report on the alleged irregularities in the deal and present it in Parliament.

The BJP on the other hand has hit back at Rahul and said he has been lying on the price of the fighter jet and there was a nexus between him and former French President Francois Hollande.

The BJP alleged Rahul is involved in a “conspiracy, internationally” and the former French President is part of the “nexus” to sabotage the Rafale deal.

While Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman spoke about an “international dimension” to Rahul’s attack on the PM over the deal and said Hollande’s comments were not a coincidence, Union Minister Gajendra Shekhawat alleging that the UPA Government had called off the multi-billion dollar deal after a private company linked to Robert Vadra was not chosen as a broker.

He also hinted at Pakistan’s role in the conspiracy, saying one of its leaders, former Interior Minister Rehman Malik, has even tweeted that Rahul will be the next Indian Prime Minister.

Sitharaman said the Government will fight the “perception battle” over the Rafale deal by putting facts before the masses to counter the Congress’ “false propaganda”.  “I, others will go around the country to put facts before the public. It is a matter of perception battle,” she told reporters.

The Defence Minister also rejected the Congress’ charge that the Modi Government had undermined the State-run Hindustan Aeronautics Limited, saying the HAL on an average got annual orders worth over Rs 10,000 crore during the 10-year UPA rule against annual orders of around Rs 22,000 crore given by the current dispensation so far. 

The Congress continued with its offensive  against the BJP Government over the Rafale deal, alleging corruption and violation of rules by the PM and demanded answers from him. It also accused the PM, the Finance Minister and the Defence Minister of “lying on the issue”.

Rahul  released a video of a French media portal in connection with the jet deal and appeared to suggest this is the “sad truth” about the PM. “The sad truth about India’s Commander in Thief,” Rahul said on Twitter, in an apparent attack on Modi and tagged the video along with his tweet.

The video targets the Modi Government on the Rafale deal and quoted the editor of Mediapart, a French media house, that published a story on Friday quoting Hollande as saying it was the Indian Government that “proposed” Reliance Defence as the partner of Dassault Aviation for Rafale offset contracts.

The video further noted that while the Indian Government has stated it did not have “any say in the commercial decision”, but Hollande, who had presided over the deal, said this was not true.

Later addressing public rally in  Amethi, Rahul said the contract worth thousands of crores of rupees could have provided jobs “to youth of Amethi, to engineers...It could have given employment to thousands of youth...Aircraft with French technology would have been made in India...The nation would have benefitted from it.”

“Soon after becoming the Prime Minister, ‘chowkidarji’ goes straight to France and enters into a deal with the president of that country...,” Rahul alleged.  “The company, which got the contract, was floated just ten days before...Don’t know how Anil Ambani came to know ten days before that he was going to get the contract,” he said.

“We sought a JPC probe and tweeted to Arun Jaitley also, but Jaitley’s boss Narendra Modi will not do this...I asked four questions but not even one has been replied to. You talk of big issues, give speeches, go to Rajasthan and Chattishgarh but there is not a single word about Rafale from Modi...Why, because ‘chowkidar’ has made Anil Ambani commit a theft,” Rahul said.

Earlier in the day a delegation of senior Congress leaders led by Gulam Nabi Azad met the CVC K V Chowdhary and demanded registration of a case in alleged corruption in the Rafale fighter jet deal. The delegation submitted a detailed memorandum, accusing the Government of causing loss to the public exchequer and endangering national security by bypassing state-run Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) in favour of some businessman “friends” for offset contract.

Opposition leader Sharad Yadav too sought a Joint Parliamentary Committee probe into the Rafale deal, alleging a scam in the purchase of 36 fighter aircraft. “There was a lack of transparency in this deal, and therefore people of the country have doubts about scam in the purchase of (the) Rafale fighter jets. The relevant questions have not been answered from the Government side as to why the price of one aircraft was raised from Rs 526 crore to Rs. 1570 crore,” Yadav said.

Union Minister Prakash Javadekar termed Rahul as a “directionless leader” and said the Congress chief and his party have no hope to return to power therefore they were trying to create a campaign on the basis of lies and speculations against the BJP Government. The senior BJP leader said Gandhi has no facts and evidence against the Government over the Rafale deal. The HRD Minister said there were evidences and proof when there were allegations (against former UPA Government) over the coal scam.

Interestingly BJP MP Shatrughan Sinha drew flak from a fellow party parliamentarian R K Sinha who accused him of siding with Opposition leaders, like Rahul Gandhi and Lalu Prasad by questioning the Modi Government on the Rafale deal. In his tweets, Shatrughan has called the controversy surrounding the Rafale deal a serious issue and called for the need for the Government to come clean.