New Delhi: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which has been facing Opposition fire over the Rafale deal, on Friday alleged that Congress president Rahul Gandhi was a “serial liar” and “manufacturer of fake news”.
Alleging that Gandhi’s repeated lies could not substitute the truth of the deal, Union minister Piyush Goyal cited the comments of Rafale's French manufacturer Dassault Aviation's CEO Eric Trappier to reject Gandhi's allegations.
Goyal said the French government and Dassault had “exposed” Gandhi's “fake news” and it was high time for him to stop lying.
Rejecting the suggestion that the Congress had used the issue of alleged corruption in the Rafale deal to create a perception against Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Goyal said the people of India trusted Modi and an “issue-less” party and its leadership bereft of truth were no substitute to Modi and his good governance.
The BJP had fielded the Union minister to reject Congress's charges on the Rafale deal, a day after the Dassault CEO said his firm's joint venture with Anil Ambani's group represented only around 10 per cent of the offset investments under the Rafale deal and it was in partnership talks with 100 other companies.
The Congress has been accusing the Prime Minister of forcing Dassault to select Reliance as an offset partner to help the Indian firm “pocket” Rs 30,000 crore.
Reiterating that the government had maintained the highest standards of transparency and integrity in the Rafale deal, Goyal said it had become clear that Gandhi was beating a dead horse and manufacturing fake news. The minister said the government had expeditiously purchased the aircraft due to reasons of national security and negotiated a better term than what the UPA dispensation had managed.
The Dassault CEO has categorically confirmed that offset was an obligation for his company and it selected its partners of its "volition and choice".
He also said the BJP's charge that the Congress had cancelled the deal with Dassault when it was in power as the French firm did not agree to give benefits to a defence dealer linked to Robert Vadra, Gandhi's brother-in-law.
Goyal said Gandhi's attacks on the Modi government were an attempt to deflect attention from this. "His repeated lies and falsehood after falsehood will not change reality," Goyal said, referring to Congress president's charges relating to comments attributed to former French president Fracois Hollande and those of France's current president Emmanuel Macron.
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