New Delhi: Continuing his attack on the BJP-led central government over the Rafale deal, Congress chief Rahul Gandhi today questioned about who was telling the truth among the two, Prime Minister Narendra Modi or former President of France Francois Hollande.

 “India-France joint statement clearly states that the 36 aircraft in question will be of the same configuration… Should we believe that then man standing next to PM was lying when he was giving this statement? The man (PM Modi) is lying,” Mr. Gandhi said.

On September 23, 2016, Indian and France inked a deal worth Euro 7.87 billion (approximately Rs. 59,000 crores) for 36 Rafale jets. According to Congress, the deal that was made by the UPA government was far better than the one which was replaced by the present government thus increasing its payment three times for 126 aircraft.

A video released by the party said that the NDA deal did not include several other benefits like technology transfer and generation of jobs due to the fact that the UPA deal had negotiated the manufacturing of a majority of the planes by the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited in Hyderabad.

The Congress party alleges that there was corruption in the deal for the French aircraft and says that the government at the center is ending up paying a huge amount of money to acquire fighter jets to favor a businessman.

“Anil Ambani has Rs. 45,000 crore debt. Anil Ambani does not manufacture aircraft… He formed the company 10 days before the deal. What is the deal between Anil Ambani and PM Modi?” Mr. Gandhi questioned just days after the industrialist wrote to him, expressing “deep anguish over continued personal attacks” over him and clarifying the role of his company.

Mr. Ambani had said in a letter to Mr. Gandhi that the allegations leveled by the Congress were baseless, ill-informed and unfortunate”. The letter clarified that all the 36 fighter jets will be completely manufactured in France and then exported. Even a single rupee worth component will not be manufactured by Reliance for these 36 Rafale jets.

Last week, Reliance Group issued a warning to the nine Congress leaders against making such statements with no grounds on the Rafale deal.

There has been a big controversy over the issue of Rafale deal. The deal is about buying French made Rafale fighter aircraft to be inducted in Indian Air Force. The deal was actually finalized during Congress-led UPA government.

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