In the most direct and personal attack yet against Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Monday alleged that his daughter was on the payroll of fugitive diamantaire Mehul Choksi, one of the key accused in the PNB Scam. He also demanded his sacking from the Cabinet.
Rahul claimed that Jaitley's daughter got money (from Mehul Choksi) from an ICICI account number 12170500316. As usual, Rahul Gandhi deliberately misspelt the finance Minister name as Arun Jaitlie and demanded his resignation with the hashtag 'Arun Jaitlie Must Resign'.
"Arun Jaitlie's daughter was on the payroll of thief Mehul Choksi. Meanwhile her FM daddy sat on his file & allowed him to flee. She received money from ICICI a/c no: 12170500316. It's sad that media has blacked out this story. The people of India won't. #ArunJaitlieMustResign," the tweet from Rahul Gandhi's handle stated.
The Congress has accused the Modi Government of conniving with fraudsters who had escaped the country and claimed "conflict of interest" saying his daughter and son-in-law, both lawyers, allegedly received a retainership of Rs 24 lakh from Choksi.
The party said that in the 44 months till January 2018, the Modi Government witnessed an unprecedented 19,000 'bank fraud cases' involving Rs 90,000 crore. Congress also alleged that 23 fraudsters escaped India under the Government's watch after duping the country of over Rs 53,000 crore.
Congress leader Sachin Pilot said a sinking economy, banking frauds and flying fraudsters form part of BJP's-Jaitley's 'New India' and demanded that the Minister should resign on moral grounds. "Successive escapes of Vijay Mallya, Lalit Modi, Nirav Modi, Mehul Choksi and others reflect that Modi Government is not a guardian of 'public money' but a 'travel agency' facilitating 'fraud, fleece and fly to foreign shores' of willful bank defaulters," Pilot said.
He also used a Sholay parody to attack the Modi Government over the "dubious" deal on Rafale fighter jets. Rahul used the hit song, "Ye dosti hum nahin todenge", from the film, using the pictures of Modi and Anil Ambani, whose company, according to the Congress chief, had received the offset contract worth Rs 30,000 crore in the Rafale deal. The 17-second video uploaded by the Gandhi scion on Twitter only shows the smiling faces of Modi and Ambani with the song playing in the background.