New Delhi: As the political slugfest between the Opposition and the ruling BJP over the Rafale deal continued, Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Monday released a video of a French media portal and appeared to suggest it was the “sad truth” about Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

"The sad truth about India's Commander in Thief," Gandhi said on Twitter, targeting Modi.

The video quoted the editor of Mediapart, a French media house that published a story on Friday quoting former French President Francois Hollande as saying it was the Indian government that "proposed" Reliance Defence as the partner of Dassault Aviation for Rafale offset contracts. "The key sentence in his reply is 'We did not have a choice'.

The editor said quoting Hollande, “We did not have a word to say about that subject. The Indian government suggested this service provider and Dassault negotiated with Ambani. We did not have a choice. We picked the interlocutor which was selected for us by the Indian government. That's the contract."

The video added that while the Indian government stated it did not have "any say in the commercial decision", Hollande, who had presided over the deal, said this was not true.

The sad truth about India's Commander in Thief. pic.twitter.com/USrxqlJTWe — Rahul Gandhi (@RahulGandhi) 24 September 2018

The Congress has launched an offensive against the BJP government over the Rafale deal, alleging corruption and violation of rules by Modi and demanded answers from him. It has also accused the Prime Minister, finance minister Arun Jaitley and defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman of "lying on the issue".

On Monday, a delegation of senior Congress leaders met the Central Vigilance Commissioner (CVC) and demanded the registration of a case in alleged corruption in the Rafale fighter jet deal.

The meeting comes days after a Congress delegation met the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) and urged the apex auditor to prepare a report on the alleged irregularities in the deal and present it in Parliament.