BJP spokespersons have also been told not to give credence to Rahul Gandhi by reacting to his charges, and instead ridicule him.
New Delhi: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has instructed its national spokespersons and media panellists to refrain from reacting to the opposition’s allegations on the Rafale deal.
There is a belief in the ruling party that the constant whataboutery on the defence deal could create doubts in people’s minds even if there is no corruption involved.
The Congress has turned up the heat on the NDA government, ahead of elections in five states, accusing it of buying the French Rafale fighter jets at a much-inflated price — about three times that being negotiated by the previous UPA regime — and of favouring industrialist Anil Ambani by getting an offset contract worth Rs 30,000 crore to his company that was formed just days before the defence deal was entered into.
The government has been rebutting the allegations but that hasn’t deterred the opposition party from making an issue out of it to target Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
BJP leaders said that at the party national media workshop held in New Delhi Sunday, the Rafale deal was discussed at length. They said Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, who earlier held the defence portfolio, addressed the spokespersons and provided them with details of the defence deal that could be used to counter the Congress narrative.
Sources said Jaitley advised the BJP spokespersons to not react at all, especially at the opposition attempt to project the deal as the Bofors scam of the NDA — an analogy to the controversy over the alleged kickbacks in the Swedish Bofors gun deal during the Rajiv Gandhi government in the 1980s.
Also read: Rafale deal is Bofors many times over, what it lacks is a V.P. Singh
Jaitley reportedly said if BJP spokespersons needed to counter the Congress allegations, it should be done in “humour” and not in “sincerity”.
“Congress would want us to play to their agenda. They would like to create this confusion in the minds of the people about the honesty of Modi government,” said one of the spokespersons present at the meeting.
“Why give them play? Don’t react is what the minister said and asked us to make fun of the allegations and not with sincerity and in seriousness”.
Portray Rahul as a clown prince: Jaitley
A source in the BJP said spokespersons were also told not to give credence to Congress chief Rahul Gandhi by reacting to his allegations, and instead were told to ridicule him.
“That is where Jaitley spoke about his remark calling Rahul a clown prince,” the source said. “The attempt should always be to poke fun at him. This will take away any credibility he gets when the BJP reacts to him,” the source quoted Jaitley as saying.
The gathering was also reportedly told to ridicule Rahul once a week as “he makes one silly statement every week”.
Also read: Rahul Gandhi hits out at Modi govt for targeting official who objected to Rafale deal
The spokespersons were also urged to hit back at the Congress hard and not hold back while doing shows on national or local media channels.
They have been asked to focus on Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his image of a hard-working PM who doesn’t have time to sleep. “Along with this, the transparency and the accountability of government should be highlighted we were told,” the source said.