If PM Modi has nothing to hide on Rafale deal, why is he afraid of a JPC probe, asks Cong

New Delhi:  Taking on Narendra Modi government on the controversial Rafale fighter jet deal, the Congress on Friday asked “if Modi government has nothing to hide, then why don’t they agree for a Joint Parliamentary Committee to investigate the deal?”
Referring to media reports, Congress spokesperson Abhishek Singhvi said in a press conference here, that two days before the then French President Francois Hollande came to India as the 2016 Republic Day chief guest and signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Prime Minister Narendra Modi for delivering 36 Rafale aircraft, Anil Ambani’s Reliance Entertainment entered into a deal to produce a film with Hollande’s partner and actor Julie Gayet.
“The company that would profit from the Rafale offset contract, the same company has signed a film production contract with the partner of then President of France Ms. Julie Gayet”, Mr Singhvi said.
Pointing out the PIB press release issued by the Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on February 12, 2018 that ‘no offset contract has been awarded’ the Congress spokesperson said that “the biggest lie of the Ms Sitharaman, that no allotment of ‘offset contract’ was exposed by the French Defence Minister Florence Parly herself”.
“On October, 27, 2017, French Defence Minister met Ms Sitharaman in New Delhi in the morning and laid the foundation of Reliance factory in the afternoon to execute offsets in Nagpur, along with Nitin Gadkari, Devendra Fadnavis and Anil Ambani”, he said.
Mr Singhi further said that of Rs 60000 Crore, 50 percent was offset contract. And asked, “what was the reason to choose a company which had highest amount of debt? Would this happen without government’s recommendation?”
“It was a quid pro quo deal. No question raised by the Congress on this deal has been answered by
Mr Modi or Finance Minister Jaitley”, Mr Singhvi said.
He added that the Congress party reiterates its president Rahul Gandhi’s demand for a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) probe in the multi crore deal.
UNI