Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman must place documents before Parliament to prove her claim that Modi government has given Rs 1 lakh crore worth of orders to defence PSU Hindustan Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL), or resign, Congress President Rahul Gandhi put forth a demand on Sunday.
Two days after Sitharaman made the claims in the Lok Sabha on Friday, Gandhi took to Twitter to question her claims, tagging a media report that said: "no actual order has been placed".
"When you tell one lie, you need to keep spinning out more lies to cover up the first one. In her eagerness to defend the PM's Rafale lie, the RM (Defence Minister) lied to the Parliament.
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"Tomorrow (Monday), RM (Sitharaman) must place before Parliament documents showing Rs 1 lakh crore of government orders to HAL. Or resign," said Gandhi.
The Congress president had earlier dismissed Sitharaman's arguments defending the deal to procure 36 fighter jets from France and accused her of evading his questions on the controversial deal while debating the issue in Parliament.
The BJP-led NDA government gave Rs one lakh crore worth of contracts to HAL, Sitharaman said on Friday in Lok Sabha.
"You are misleading the country by saying the NDA government reduced 126 Rafale jets to 36. Congress was supposed to buy 18 in fly-away condition, the NDA raised that to 36," she said.
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Sitharaman also said the Congress is only shedding crocodile tears on the HAL not getting the offset contract as it did nothing to scale up the capacity of the state-run firm.
(With Agency Inputs)
