CAG report on Rafale deal: BJP wants Rahul Gandhi to say sorry

Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad has sought an apology from Congress president Rahul Gandhi saying the "SC order and CAG report on the Rafale jet deal has exposed his lies". Gandhi, however, rejected the report saying it did not mention the dissent note by negotiators.

The Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) traded barbs over CAG findings on Rafale deal in the report submitted to Parliament on February 13.

Dubbing the Opposition alliance as the "mahajhootbandhan", Union Minister Arun Jaitley took a dig at the Congress in a series of tweets saying, "It cannot be that the Supreme Court is wrong, the CAG is wrong and only the dynasty is right."

Speaking to media, Jaitley added: "This is Congress legacy… In 1989, the Rajiv government manufactured, framed a St Kitts issue against V P Singh who was a clean man. Exactly 30 years



later, history is repeating itself. The Congress’s scandals are evident from court proceedings. They want to malign the image of Prime Minister Modi."

Addressing the media, Gandhi contended that the CAG conclusion on the new contract being 2.86 percent lower than that of the UPA government "demolishes" the government's insistence that the deal was 9 percent and 20 percent cheaper.

Reading out a "dissent note" by three senior Ministry of Defence officials, who, he claimed, were part of the Indian negotiating team, Gandhi said the note crushes the government's claims on pricing and faster delivery of Rafale jets.

"So here stands demolished the two pillars on which the entire government’s argument for the new deal are based. There is only one reason the new deal has been carried out and that is to give Anil Ambani Rs 30,000 crore," Gandhi said.