Congress’ ecosystem attacks Rafale deal based on a video by Raju Srivastava

The Supreme Court has already given a clean chit to Modi government over Rafale deal case earlier in this month but it seems that the Congress party and its ecosystem are still not satisfied as they are leaving no stone unturned to project a clean deal as a scam. Recently, Union Minister of Railways Piyush Goyal shared a video clip of comedian Raju Srivastava. Raju Srivastava in one of the lines said, “Instead of HAL, Rafale deal was given to the private sector.” He also elaborated the reasons behind this by describing the sad state of government schools, government bus etc, and concluded that the decision of allocating Rafale deal to the private sector was a good one.

The Congress ecosystem latched on this satire video clip and started targeting the government over Rafale deal. For some bizarre reasons best known to them only, they concluded that the Private sector means Reliance ADAG only.

There are so many factual inaccuracies in their claims. As it has been already cleared by many that on the offset front, a small percentage of total offset contracts worth 850 crores were awarded to Reliance Defense. Dassault Aviation was free to choose the companies for offset deals and it chose Reliance Defense among many others. The total offset obligation is worth Rs. 30,000 crores and Reliance Defense awarded only a small percentage of the total offset contract.  Previously, Dassault aviation had issued a press release in which it clearly stated that choosing offset partner was Dassault’s call with no involvement of Government or Defense Ministry. The companies chosen for offset contracts include BTSL, DEFSYS, Kinetic, Mahindra, Maini, SAMTE and negotiations are going on with more than 70 companies for offset contracts. 

For more details: Dassault CEO confirms, NDA era Rafale deal cheaper than UPA era one

And as far as the Congress and its ecosystem’s new found love for HAL is concerned so it is just a tool to target the incumbent government. In the past, the Congress party virulently targeted HAL and questioned its capabilities. On Mar 03, 2012, the then MoS defense, Pallam Raju accepted on record that HAL was not able to meet the expectations of Indian Air Force.

Furthermore, in October 2013, UPA Government told the Delhi High Court that HAL’s poor workmanship was to blame for MiG-21 accidents. They even blamed Hindustan Aeronautics Limited for a spinal injury to an air force pilot.

Recently, in AgustaWestland case, the ED submitted remand paper in the Delhi Patiala High Court in which it revealed that it is investigating the modus operandi to eliminate TATA and Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) from competition in an Italian deal. 

This revelation makes the claims of the Congress President Rahul Gandhi on the Rafale offset contracts not being awarded to HAL not even worth consideration. It becomes very apparent that the then UPA government not only manipulated the process but did so specifically so the contract would not go to the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited, as opposed to the decision-making process on the Rafale deal validity of which has been upheld by the Supreme Court.

Having said that, it is safe to conclude that the Congress and its ecosystem has again made a mockery of themselves by taking a satire video by Raju Srivastava deadly seriously.