Rahul fires fresh salvo, questions PM’s silence
AMETHI: Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Monday again targeted Narendra Modi over the Rafale deal and accused the Prime Minister of snatching away money from the poor and handing it over to his industrialists friends.
He asked why the Rafale price was not disclosed and how Anil Ambani’s Reliance Group got the contract for it. “The chowkidar of the country has taken out Rs 20,000 crore from the pockets of the poor, martyrs and the jawans and put it in the pocket of Ambani,” Gandhi said in his Lok Sabha constituency of Amethi, where he was greeted as a ‘Shiv Bhakt’ (a devotee of Lord Shiva) following his Kailash Mansarovar pilgrimage.
Rahul said the people want to know the amount involved in the Rafale deal.
He recalled the debate in Parliament on the deal and said the Prime Minister could not look him in the eye. “Modi gives speeches but no answers... he does not have the courage to reply,” he said.
He said the farmers and the poor were crying. “The government is providing all benefits to five or 10 people,” he said.
The BJP has repeatedly rubbished Gandhi and the Opposition’s allegations of corruption and lack of transparency in the deal. The Reliance Group, in a statement quoting Anil Ambani’s letter to Rahul Gandhi last month, had said, “Allegations of Reliance benefitting by thousands of crores is a figment of imagination, promoted by vested interests.”
“Simply put, no contract exists with the Government of India.”
French company Dassault, which is supplying the fighter jets, has entered into a joint venture with the Reliance Group to meet its offset obligations to create business for Indian firms following the Rafale deal.
Earlier, as Gandhi’s cavalcade reached his Lok Sabha constituency, supporters started shouting ‘Bam Bam Bhole’ amid the chants of ‘mantras’ and blowing of conch shells. Gandhi, who had gone on a pilgrimage to Kailash Mansarovar earlier this month, performed a ‘puja’ and met ‘kanwariyas’ who had assembled there. The Congress party also tweeted a short video of the welcome and prayers.
About a hundred saffron-clad ‘kanwariyas’ had assembled for the event.