New Delhi, Jul 25(NIE): Slamming the Congress for “distortion’’ of facts and ‘’manufacturing fake Rafale controversy’’, Union minister Arun Jaitley maintained that the move failed to cut ice as the fighter aircraft deal with France was a “government-to-government agreement with no private group involved”. Jaitley also criticised the main Opposition party for “redefining secularism as a euphemism for majority bashing’’ and thereby antagonising the majority against itself. He said that by attacking the BJP on certain issues, the Congress is engaged in an implied battle with the federal front in order to reclaim the minority vote.

According to the senior BJP leader, the Congress has realised that the next election would be a referendum on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s performance. “The Congress party’s strategy of consolidating arithmetic against Prime Minister Modi’s chemistry is a double edged weapon for the Congress. It can push the Congress to the margin with the federal front occupying the opposition’s space,’’ Jaitley wrote in his Facebook post.

“The popularity gap between the PM and his competitors is very wide,” he said, adding that the Congress is either non-existent or a poor third or fourth in states like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal, which account for 50 per cent of the Lok Sabha seats. The Congress is, therefore, faced with the prospect of effectively contesting only about 225 seats where it will face a direct clash with the BJP, Jaitley said.

“Its strategy, therefore, is one of distortion. If you have no issue, manufacture one. Hence the Rafale’s fake controversy,” he said in the blog titled ‘The Congress Party and the fake issue of Rafale’.

“It involves national security and it is the armed forces which have preferred this aircraft for its improved combat ability,” Jaitley wrote.