BJP, Cong battle it out over Agusta issue

Shimla: A war of words has intensified between BJP and Congress on the Agusta Westland issue.

While chief minister Jai Ram Thakur had attacked the Congress on Monday, saying the party is worried as the name of its top leadership has surfaced in the case, state Congress president Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu hit back at the BJP on Tuesday, alleging that it was Prime Minister Narendra Modi who is involved in the deal.

BJP MP Anurag Thakur questioned the Congress about the “Italian lady and her son” as mentioned by Christian Michel during the interrogation.

Sukhu said by tossing up names of top Congress leaders in the AgustaWestland case, BJP is trying unsuccessfully to take political mileage. He claimed that truth is that after coming to power in 2014, BJP removed Augusta Westland from the list of blacklisted companies and allowed it to participate in the tender process, proving that the Prime Minister was directly involved in the entire deal.

Sukhu said Congress is being unnecessarily dragged into the controversy. He said investigation should be held to know what was the motive of BJP government to remove AgustaWestland from blacklisted companies and to make it join the tendering process.

Anurag said during questioning by the enforcement directorate, Christian Michel has mentioned about an “Italian lady”. He said the arrest of Christian Michel has proved the involvement of Congress in the deal.

The CM on Monday had said the Union government had brought Christian Michel to India. And Congress has started to raise hue and cry now as it feared that secrets of the Gandhi family would come out.