The Congress on Tuesday claimed that the Rafale deal was the "biggest scam" that the country has ever seen and accused the Narendra Modi government of giving "exemptions" to two French companies in selecting offset partners.
Congress spokesperson Pawan Khera said the waivers, granted on August 24, 2016, were "exemptions" given to Dassault Aviation and another private French company from having to comply with provisions of the Standard Contract Document of the Defence Procurement Procedure, DPP-2013.
He alleged that the waivers concerned two key issues -- the provisions to be made in the offset contracts for arbitration and access to books of accounts of the industrial suppliers, which shows that the deal was a "scam" and certain favourites were "obliged".
"Modi who screams and scrams on the issue of corruption must open his mouth on the loot and scoot of 28 economic offenders like Nirav Modi, Mehul Choksi, Vijay Mallya, Jatin Mehta, among others, who looted Rs 1 lakh crore from our banks. Modi must tell who in his PMO was managing the money collections during demonetisation as shown in the video sting today," he asked.
"In election season, Modi can brazenly use government agencies as political allies to target opponents but cannot run away from his role in the Rafale scam. Brand new evidences of subverting procedures, naked crony capitalism, compromising national interests, gross impropriety and colossal corruption have once again been exposed in the Rafale scam," he alleged.
The Congress leader alleged that these companies were no longer required to submit their offset plans, identities of their Indian Offset Partners (IOP) and the details of their work share and specific products, and supporting documents indicating IOP eligibility at the bid stage, as laid down earlier in DPP, 2013.