Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman. (Express file photo)
Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday said that any comparison between the Rafale fighter aircraft deal signed by the BJP government with the Bofors howitzer gun deal signed by the Congress government in the 1980s is not valid.
Responding to a question, she said, “The Congress may raise the Rafale issue in Parliament. I welcome them raising it.” She added that “don’t even compare Rafale deal with Bofors. There is no scam here.”
The BJP government had signed a deal for 36 Rafale fighter jets from France in 2016, and cancelled the process for buying 126 of the fighters under a commercial deal being negotiated by the UPA government. Opposition parties have claimed that the BJP’s deal for Rafale was more expensive than the UPA-era bid, and the government has refused to share the detailed breakdown of costs citing national security.
Sitharaman also said that infiltration on the Line of Control (LoC) has come down because of the Army’s actions.
While it may not have been fully stopped, the rise in number of incidents on the LoC is because of the reduced infiltration despite militants being pushed across by Pakistan army into Kashmir, she said.
There has been a spike in the number of ceasefire violations on the LoC, with the Army using artillery in the Uri sector of Northern Kashmir last month. There were 860 ceasefire violations recorded on the LoC last year, while the first two months of this year have already seen more than 420 ceasefire violations.
“At this stage, there is no rethinking on AFSPA in J&K and the Northeast,” Sitharaman said.
There have been periodic demands from various sections of PDP for a relook on AFSPA, which has been in force since the onset of militancy in Kashmir in 1990.
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