Rafale deal: Days after showdown in LS, Rahul Gandhi, Nirmala Sitharaman engage in Twitter war of words

Two days after a fierce debate in the Lok Sabha on alleged irregularities in the Rafale deal, defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Sunday engaged in a war of words on Twitter. During the debate in Parliament on Friday, Sitharaman said procurement orders for Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) worth a total of Rs 1 lakh crore are “in the pipeline.” A report by The Times of India on Sunday quoted an HAL official as saying that no order has been signed till now. The report, however, also pointed out that the Lok Sabha record showed that Sitharaman had not claimed that the orders were signed, and only said that they were in the works. Responding to the report, Rahul said, “When you tell one lie, you need to keep spinning out more lies, to cover up the first one. In her eagerness to defend the prime minister’s Rafale lie, the RM lied to Parliament. Tomorrow, RM must place before Parliament documents showing 1 Lakh crore of Govt orders to HAL. Or resign.” In response, the official handle of Sitharaman also asked the Congress president to resign, and accused him of “spreading lies.”

A note attached by the defence minister mentioned the details of contracts signed with HAL from 2014 to 2018. These included contracts for equipment for the Army, Air Force, Navy and Coast Guard. [caption id=“attachment_5035521” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File image of defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman. PTI[/caption] ‘BJP resorting to hair-splitting’ Party spokesperson Manish Tewari said the Congress will press for her resignation in case she fails to substantiate her claim in Parliament that HAL was given contracts worth Rs one lakh crore. Tewari alleged that the problem with the BJP-led NDA government is that whenever they are confronted with facts, they try and resort to hair splitting. “Chicanery rather than an assertion of the truth has been the syna qua non of this government,” he said during a press briefing The Congress leader said it is a strange situation and wondered why the HAL is borrowing to pay salaries, if it has funds. “The Congress will demand answers from the government in Parliament and if a reply does not come, it will take appropriate steps. If the defence minister does not provide documents and evidence of the claims made by her, then the Congress party will demand the resignation of the defence minister,” he said. The Congress has been targeting Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the Rafale deal, alleging that the price of each aircraft was sharply hiked from around Rs 526 crore, negotiated under the deal during UPA, to Rs 1,600 crore and that the contract will help Anil Ambani get a Rs 30,000 crore benefit through offset contract. Sitharaman says Rafale will bring Modi back to power On Friday, Sitharaman accused the Congress of misleading the country with “falsehood” on Rafale deal and said while the Bofors scam brought the Congress down, Rafale will bring Prime Minister Narendra Modi back into power. Countering the Congress’ charge, she said that it was the Indian Air Force which suggested that the government buy two squadrons or 36 Rafale jets in fly-away condition instead of 18, as was planned to be purchased under the Congress-led UPA government. She accused the Congress of compromising with national security in the interest of the party’s “treasury” while deciding on buying 126 fighter jets. With regard to pricing difference, Sitharaman said there was no formal price noting by the Congress of Rs 526 crore as the deal price. But the price negotiated by the NDA government is nine percent lower than what was negotiated by UPA. “Comparing the cost of Rs 526 crore with Rs 1,600 crore, is like comparing apples to oranges. The cost quoted in 2007, will it remain the same in 2016, because there is escalation cost and there is exchange rate variation,” she said. “The price of the basic aircraft cannot be compared with price of weaponised aircraft,” the minister further said. With inputs from PTI