Since more than a year, Congress president Rahul Gandhi is using Anil Ambani to attack prime minister Narendra Modi. He had been alleging that Modi gave Anil Ambani Rs 30,000 crore from the Rafale deal, which has no logical basis.
Continuing this baseless attack, Rahul Gandhi had recently said that the fund his proposed NYAY scheme will come from “crony capitalists” like Anil Ambani. He had also invited PM Modi for a debate on various issues on jobs and corruption. He had said that he needs only 10 minutes, and he is ready for the debate anywhere, but not at Anil Ambani’s house.
Now the Reliance Group has come up with a statement strongly rebutting the allegations made by Rahul Gandhi. A spokesperson of the company reminded that during the term of UPA government, Anil Ambani’s Reliance Group was awarded projects worth over Rs 1,00,000 crore in key infrastructure sectors.
A Reliance Group spokesperson said, “the Congress Party President Mr. Rahul Gandhi, in his typical cavalier fashion has continued his campaign of calumny, disinformation, distortion and malicious lies. Yesterday, he has singled out our group chairman Shri Anil D Ambani as allegedly a crony capitalist and dishonest businessman – all obviously patently untrue statements.”
The statement said that Rahul Gandhi has attributed no basis to the claims that he has been making against Anil Ambani, and neither he has provided any credible evidence at all to justify his “derogatory and defamatory campaign”.
The spokesperson said that Reliance Group has chosen to ignore Mr. Rahul Gandhi’s comments with continuing patience and restraint, and they dismiss the Rahul Gandhi’s latest remarks as another one of his multiple untruthful utterances. The statement also notes that the Congress president is facing contempt proceedings in the Supreme Court for such comments.
The statement further adds, “We would like to remind Mr. Rahul Gandhi, that it was during the 10 year Congress led UPA regime between 2004 and 2014 that the Anil Ambani led Reliance Group was awarded projects of over Rs. 1,00,000 crores across diverse key nation building infrastructure sectors such as power, telecom, roads, metro, by a Government led by none other than Mr. Rahul Gandhi’s own political party – the Congress”.
The Reliance Group asked Rahul Gandhi to clarify whether his Congress government was supporting an alleged crony capitalist and dishonest businessman for 10 years.
The company said that it is proud to have made this contribution to the country, creating the much-needed investments and jobs, a critical backbone for a vibrant, strong and growth-oriented economy.
“The Reliance group is a proud young Indian group with over 1,00,000 employees and over 8 million strong shareholders, the largest in the world and completely dedicated to our great country – Bharat”, the statement added.
It may be noted that while Rahul Gandhi has been attacking Anil Ambani on a daily basis for over a year, the company has reacted only a few times. Earlier they had issued statements rebutting specific allegations made by Rahul Gandhi, and filed defamation suits against Congress leaders for statements made against the company. Compared to the defensive statements issued earlier, today’s statement by the company marks a change in strategy, by directly attacking the Congress president citing the projects the company was awarded by the UPA government.
