Amid the growing outcry alleging massive corruption in the Rafale fighter jet agreement, lawyer-activist Prashant Bhushan said that the deal involves both financial corruption and compromise with national security, unlike the Bofors scam.
Replying to a question on whether the Rafale issue is comparable to the alleged scam in the purchase of Bofors howitzers during the Rajiv Gandhi government's tenure in 1980s, Bhushan said; "not only corruption was was committed but national security has also been compromised (with the Rafale deal)...Bofors scandal was a Rs 64-crore commission scam, but there was no issue of compromise with national security. In Rafale scam, there is commission scam of Rs 20,000 crore in which national security has (also) been compromised."
Bhushan, along with former Union ministers Yashwant Sinha and Arun Shourie, has moved the Supreme Court seeking a CBI probe into the Rafale deal.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday asked the Centre for pricing details of the 36 Rafale fighter jets India is buying from France in a sealed cover within 10 days in response to PILs.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi had announced the procurement of a batch of 36 Rafale jets after talks with the then French President Francois Hollande on April 10, 2015 in Paris. The final deal was sealed on September 23, 2016.
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