Soon after the Supreme Court dismissed the Centre’s ‘preliminary objections’ Wednesday, allowing the admissibility of three documents in the Rafale deal as evidence in re-examining the review petitions filed against its 14 December judgement, Opposition leaders have started describing it as a big blow to the Union government. They have conveniently forgotten the fact that it was the same court which had said there was no occasion to doubt the decision-making process of the Modi government and dismissed all the petitions seeking direction to the CBI to register an FIR for alleged irregularities in the jet deal.
The Congress, which has the dark past of Bofors, 2G and Commonwealth Games, is now posing as a saint, especially with the country undergoing elections from today. Reacting to Wednesday’s order of the SC, Congress president Rahul Gandhi said, ‘The PM has been claiming that SC had given him clean chit on Rafale deal. The Supreme Court has now clarified and has begun the real probe into the deal.’ Inviting Modi to have a one-on-one debate with him over Rafale issue and also corruption, Rahul said, ‘If he debates with me, he will not be able to see eye-to-eye with the people of the country.’
Rahul should also be ready for debates on all the corruption charges faced by the Congress so far. As put by Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, the Supreme Court verdict Wednesday only accepted to review the confidential documents presented before it in Rafale case. She has also accused Rahul of committing contempt of court by ‘fabricating statements by SC’ on Rafale verdict. Lashing out at the Congress chief, Nirmala said he had crossed the line of decency in his comments on the court’s order and added that it underlines his frustration that he was attributing words to the SC that it never uttered. The order was limited to whether the documents, which the government had argued should not be considered by the court as they were obtained illegally, should be accepted by the apex court or not.