Mediapart published a new ‘expose’ on the Rafale deal alleging payments were made to a middleman to secure the deal. However, the payments were made when the UPA Government was in power, the ‘fake invoices’ published by the French media portal revealed.
Nonetheless, before reading the actual content of the ‘expose’, Congress accounts on social media leapt on to the matter to accuse the NDA Government at the center of corruption. In reality, the payments were made before Narendra Modi became Prime Minister and projects the Congress party itself in poor light.
Congress accounts target Narendra Modi, NDA Govt over Mediapart ‘expose’ on the Rafale Deal
Telangana Pradesh Congress Sevadal used the report to claim that it was evidence of ‘Rafale Scam’.
Rohan Gupta, Chairman of the Social Media Department of the Indian National Congress, asked, “How long can you cover up theft?”
Surbhi, a state coordinator for Odisha Pradesh Congress Sevadal, shared the report with great enthusiasm, blissfully ignoring that the kickbacks in the new ‘expose’ were made when the Congress party was in power.
Vijay Thottathil, a Congress activist, used the report to claim that India is now a banana republic.
Media sings Congress tunes
The media, too, played its part in promoting the narrative favoured by the Congress party. They were careful not to mention in their tweets that the payments to middlemen were made in the Congress era. NDTV, as expected, was at the forefront of it.
Again, as expected, The Wire was part of the charade as well.
Others were more subtle in peddling their agenda.
What does the new Mediapart ‘expose’ on the Rafale Deal say?
The Mediapart report detailing its new ‘expose’, said, “It involves offshore companies, dubious contracts and ‘false’ invoices. Mediapart can reveal that detectives from India’s federal police force, the Central Bureau of Investigations (CBI), and colleagues from the Enforcement Directorate (ED), which fights money laundering, have had proof since October 2018 that Dassault paid at least €7.5 million in secret commissions to middleman Sushen Gupta.”
The ‘fake invoices’ cited by Mediapart occurred when the UPA Government was in power. According to the invoices, payments totaling around 11 million Euros were made to a firm in Singapore. “According to an accounts spreadsheet belonging to Sushen Gupta, an entity called simply ‘D’, which is a code he regularly used to designate Dassault, paid €14.6 million to Interdev in Singapore over the period 2004-2013,” the media outlet’s own report from April this year said.
Quite clearly, the invoices are related to a deal that the UPA Government was trying to make. After the NDA Government came to power, the UPA era deal was scrapped and the Indian Government secured a government-to-government deal that involved India buying 36 Rafale jets directly from the French Government. Then Defense Minister Manohar Parrikar had said that the UPA era deal was not viable and had not been closed either.
