Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Monday dared Prime Minister Narendra Modi for a 15-minute debate on the controversial Rafale deal.
The Congress president said the statement given by Union Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in Parliament is false. Rahul Gandhi again requested the defence minister and PM Modi to answer “if senior officers of the Indian Air Force (IAF) and Ministry oF Defence (MoD) objected to her interference in Rafael deal” in a “Yes or No” on Monday.
The Lok Sabha on Monday witnessed a heated discussion on the Rafale deal controversy where attack and counter-attack between Rahul Gandhi and Nirmala Sitharaman on the Rafale deal process under the NDA government took place. Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said in the Lok Sabha that she had received confirmation from HAL that contracts during 2014-18 worth Rs 26,570.80 crore were signed with it while orders worth Rs 73,000 crore approx are in the pipeline.
On January 2, 2019, hitting out at the Modi government of trying to benefit Anil Ambani’s defence firm in the Rafale deal, Rahul Gandhi once again levelled allegation on the Prime Minister Narendra Modi and said that the reality is that Rs 30,000 crore has been given to Reliance’s Anil Ambani, therefore our Chowkidaar PM is a thief. Rahul Gandhi also responded to Finance Minister Arun Jaitley’s charge that where does the Congress party get the figure of Rs 1,600 crore. He said Jaitley in his Parliament speech had said the deal is Rs 58,000 crore, therefore if you divide by 36, Rs 1600 crore is the figure you get.
Earlier, Rahul Gandhi had questioned that why the pricing of the Rafale jets was not disclosed and why the state-owned HAL was not chosen as an offset partner or manufacturer of the French aircraft.
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