After Rahul Gandhi’s cutting attack over Rafale deal, BJP’s retort - ‘He is playing in hands of Pakistan’

Facing the heat of Congress president Rahul Gandhi’s cutting attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi after the new revelations in the controversial Rafale aircraft deal, the Bharatiya Janata Party on Saturday brought Pakistan angle in the story.

Addressing a press conference, Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad alleged that the Congress president, who wants to know the price of Rafale aircraft, was “playing in the hands of enemies of India (Pakistan) by insisting upon disclosure of all weaponry system.”

“He (Rahul Gandhi) is saying tell us the price of each Rafale aircraft so that our enemies get alerted. He wants to help Pakistan. Its my charge with full sense of responsibility,” Prasad said during the presser.

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However, the Congress president argues that France had already said that price is not a secret and Indian government can tell the price to anybody it wants to.

The Union Minister came out in support of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and lashed out at the Congress president for his remark that former French President Francois Hollande "is calling PM Modi a thief".

“Never before in history of independent India, has a party president used such words for a PM. We can't expect anything else from Rahul Gandhi. He has no quality or ability, he's there due to his family,” the BJP leader said.

After Hollande’s revelation that it was the Modi government who proposed the name of the Indian partner for Dassault Aviation, which is responsible for making the Rafale aircraft.

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On this, the Gandhi scion had said, “For the first time, an ex-French President is calling our PM a thief. It is a question of the dignity of the office of Prime Minister. It is the question of the future of our jawans and the Air Force.”

Parsad also refused a joint parliamentary committee probe into the deal, which was demanded by the Congress president, saying that it cannot be done merely to satisfy the ego of "an arrogant and ill-informed leader repeating lies after lies".