Rafale Saga: Reliance Infrastructure Terms Rahul Gandhi’s Allegations As ‘Blatant Lies’ And ‘Distorted Facts’

Rejecting the allegations of Congress President Rahul Gandhi that Dassault has invested Rs 248 crore in a loss-making Indian entity to secure Rafale Jet deal, Reliance Infrastructure Ltd (RIL) rubbished the allegations as 'blatant lies', reports The Times of India.

A release by RIL stated that Congress is resorting to 'blatant lies' and 'distorted' facts to mount an 'unwarranted campaign of calumny and falsehood' against Reliance Group and its Chairman Anil Ambani.

The Dassault investment on Reliance Airport Developers Limited (RADL) had no link to the Rafale deal made between the Indian and French governments.

"This investment is an independent arms-length transaction based on the fair market valuation of the land and assets of the company and the future business potential in the airports and related infrastructure sector," stated the release.

"Reliance Infrastructure Ltd is a publicly listed company has more than 10 per cent ownership by public institutions such as Life Insurance Corporation, General Insurance Corporation of India and over 15 per cent ownership with reputed global institutional investors," it added.

Reliance has affirmed that the RADL transaction was done in full compliance with the relevant FDI and all other rules and regulations, the information also has been in the public domain since December 2017.

The company also termed Congress allegations as "factually incorrect and preposterous"

"We repeat it is a blatant lie to state that land at Mihan was bought from funds provided by Dassault," it said, adding that the transaction relating to purchase of land was completed well before the investment by Dassault in RADL.

The Congress has earlier accused the Modi government of forcing Dassault Aviation to make Reliance Defence its offset partner for the Rs 580 billion deal to purchase 36 Rafale jets. It alleged that the government had unduly favoured the Anil Ambani group get a contract worth Rs 300 billion from the deal.