PM Narendra Modi ‘personally’ re-negotiated Rafale defence deal with France: Rahul Gandhi

NEW DELHI: Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday continued with his relentless attacks on Prime Minister Narendra Modi over an allegation of corruption in the defence deal signed with the French government to purchase Rafale fighter jets.


In the latest round of the attacks, the Congress chief pointed that since 2014, when NDA came to power, the government has appointed four different ministers as the head of the defence ministry. This, he alleged, gave the Prime Minister "space" to personally "re-negotiate" the deal.

"Since 2014, India has had 4 revolving Raksha Mantris. Now we know why. It gave the PM space to personally re-negotiate RAFALE with the French. India has had 4 “RAFALE Mantris”. But, none of them knows what really transpired in France. Except for the PM. But he won’t speak!" Rahul wrote in a tweet as he embedded a cartoon by Amul taking a dig at the Rafale controversy and carrying a quote "Pass or Rafail?".

Rahul's tweet was preceded by a notice, submitted to Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan, to move a privilege motion against PM Modi and Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman for allegedly misleading the House by not revealing the price of the Rafale fighter jets purchased from France.

The debate over the allegations in the Rafale defence deal started on Friday, when the Congress chief, addressing the Lok Sabha during a no-confidence motion against the government, accused PM Modi and defence minister Sitharaman of "misleading" the people of the country and Parliament over the defence deal.

On Monday, a displeased BJP lashed out at the Congress chief, saying that the latter's understanding of national security issues is poor and his party's stand is not in national interest.

Even as both the parties hurled accusations at each other, four BJP MPs submitted a privilege motion against Rahul Gandhi, accusing him of "misleading" Parliament by making "false" allegations against PM Modi and defence minister Sitharaman.