NEW DELHI: Congress has claimed that industrialist Anil Ambani was aware of the Rafale fighter contract even when none of the government principals were aware of it.

Addressing a press conference as part of Congress’s nationwide campaign on the Rafale contract, AICC spokesman and former minister Jaipal Reddy said, “The foreign secretary did not know the deal was being signed and then defence minister Manohar Parrikar was not present in France when it happened. But Ambani knew about the deal and registered his company just 12 days before the contract.

This, when the foreign secretary said that talks were on between Dassault and HAL (for offset contract).”

Training his guns at the PM, Reddy said, “Narendra Modi entered into a contract on his own. He behaved like a ‘medieval monarch’. He was in Paris. The spirit of Louis XIV... he was the emperor of France who said ‘I am the State’.”

Reddy reiterated Congress’s charge that the cabinet committee on security was not taken into confidence and that the air force was not consulted. The senior Congress leader said it was bizarre that the Indian government and defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman were citing a “confidentiality clause” for not disclosing figures about the contract while the French company has made public the details.

He said UPA’s defence minister A K Antony has denied any such clause exists.

