CONG, GOVT SPAR OVER RAFALE DEAL DURING JAITLEY’S SPEECH

The war of words between the opposition and the government over the Rafale deal continued on Thursday with Union finance minister Arun Jaitley stating that the new trend is to manufacture allegations of corruption against the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) and Congress chief Rahul Gandhi continuing to insist that Prime Minister Narendra Modi was not answering his questions because there was something “fishy” in it.

Referring to Gandhi’s demand for revealing the cost of the Rafale deal, Jaitley told the Lok Sabha on Thursday that not disclosing the price of defence transactions was in the larger interest of India’s security. “You can give approximate price but if you give exact price, you give away details of the weapons purchased,” he said in reply to a discussion.

Jaitley cited the replies given to Parliament by former defence minister Pranab Mukherjee (during the UPA’s rule) in which he had refused to disclose defence deal prices. “So, please ask your party president to go back to Pranab Mukherjee and take certain lessons from him,” the finance minister told the Congress members. “They are seriously compromising India’s security by asking for Rafale deal price ,” he said.

At this point, Congress member Shashi Tharoor shot back: “You are accountable to Parliament to disclose expenditure of public money.” Gandhi wanted to speak since Jaitley had taken his name. However, Jaitley did not yield and continued with his speech amid a ruckus created by Congress members.Earlier, Gandhi stepped up his attack on the government over the Rafale deal.

Referring to Modi’s speeches in Parliament on Wednesday, he told reporters that it was clear that the Prime Minister was not interested in answering “fundamental questions”