The Big Story: In plane sight

The government cannot claim that it did not ask for this. Soon after Prime Minister Narendra Modi renegotiated what had been the Congress-led government’s order for 126 Rafale aircraft from France and said that India would be getting 36 fighter jets instead, the Bharatiya Janata Party began chest-thumping and insisting the prime minister had personally secured a better deal.

Then Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman went further. She said that the difference between the Congress-run United Progressive Alliance and the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance was transparency. “I’m not running away from giving you specific numbers,” she said. “We will give you... I don’t mind about the cost and the amount which is being paid, agreed to be paid, because those are public money.”

Months later, the government’s insistence that it has secured a better deal, coupled with a refusal to live up to this promise of transparency, has turned into an embarrassing, unbecoming spat that has most recently led to a flurry of privilege motions in Parliament from both the BJP and the Congress.

The Congress has been contending that the government’s refusal to share details suggests that there is something fishy about it. The party is hell bent on turning Rafale into the BJP’s Bofors moment, as many recall the weapons procurement deal that became a corruption scandal for Rajiv Gandhi’s government in the 1980s. The presence in the deal of Anil Ambani’s Reliance ADAG, despite no prior expertise with manufacturing fighter jets, has given the Congress additional fuel.

The demand for transparency, especially once it has been so definitively promised, is important and the government must be pushed on this. Yet, for Congress President Rahul Gandhi to mention a private conversation with the French President, as he did during last week’s no-confidence debate in Parliament, is not just wrong but also counter-productive.

Still, this offence looks tiny in comparison to the BJP’s trespasses: It wants to claim that Modi personally secured a better deal without having to explain what the deal itself was. The prime minister reportedly decided on the order of the 36 aircraft without consulting the Ministry of Defence or the Cabinet Committee on Security. Nothing prevents the government from providing information to a privileged committee, or giving certain Opposition leaders temporary security clearances under provisions in the agreement – an option to which French President Emmanuel Macron said he is open. Even supporters of the deal have suggested this.

Will that placate Rahul Gandhi, now that he has turned the deal into a public campaign? It is unlikely. But it is essential for the government to explain why it is reneging on its offer. The affair speaks to the problem with the Modi government’s approach: centralised decision-making coupled with a desire to chest-thump that turns into accusations of sceptics being “anti-national” when the boasts are subject to scrutiny. The government promised transparency on the aircraft deal. It must now find a way to at least deliver Parliamentary oversight. Anything less would be a betrayal of the public.

Punditry

  • Stunting due to hunger also holds back the prospects of an entire generation in India, argues Vikram Patel in the Indian Express.
  • If the Supreme Court looks beyond the essential practices doctrine, it can lead to a radical re-reading of the Constitution, writes Suhrith Parthasarthy in the Hindu.
  • Delhi needs to involved the states when it comes to foreign trade policy, argues Bidanda Chengappa in the Business Line.

Giggle

Don’t Miss

In Kerala’s Adivasi belt, women are protesting to save a project for the poor that transformed lives, reports TA Ameerudheen.

“Since July 2, braving heavy rain and inclement weather, women have been assembling at a spot in Agali town both day and night to protest against any move to bring the Attappady Comprehensive Tribal and Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups Development Project under the control of gram panchayats by delinking it from the National Rural Livelihood Mission.

‘Gram panchayats will take away our rights and will destroy the goodwill generated by the four-year-old project,’ said 57-year-old Maruthi, secretary of Thai Kula Sangham, a women’s collective that was formed in 2001 to curb alcoholism among the Adivasi community but later got involved in environmental activism. ‘It will affect the livelihood of thousands of Adivasi families.’”