Centre was busy covering up Rafale deal, says Congress

Jaipur: AICC spokesperson Gourav Bhallabh on Tuesday accused the Modi government of covering up the Rafale deal.

He alleged that former CVC Vinod Rai, Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal and Baba Ramdev were co-conspirators in levelling false allegations against the then UPA government.

Bhallabh said on October 4, 2018, two former Union ministers of BJP and a senior lawyer submitted a complaint to the director CBI, citing massive corruption in the Rafale deal. Just a few days later (October 11), the government of Mauritius through its attorney general had supplied the documents to the CBI regarding alleged pay off. As a consequence, the Modi government on October 23 removed the CBI director Alok Verma in a midnight coup and appointed its protege M Nageshwar Rao as CBI chief.

He said the UPA government negotiated Rafale aircraft including transfer of technology for Rs 526.10 crore per plane after an international tender for 126 planes. Modi government bought the same jet off the shelf (without tender) for Rs 1,670 crore per plane without transfer of technology. The difference in cost of 36 planes purchased by Centre is a whopping Rs 41,205 crore. tnn


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