Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar lashed out at Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi for his 'dalali' remarks, saying in a veiled attack “Those people who have spent most of their life in dalali, they know what is dalali."
Speaking at a public meeting organised by the BJP in Mr. Parrikar’s home town of Mapusa on Monday evening, Mr. Parrikar also decried attempts to politicise the Army's successful surgical strikes and said that the people of India did not require proof of the counter-terror operation.
"Some see dalali in this... Submarine deal in 2002, there was dalali scam. Then in a helicopter deal, there was dalali. After that in the Pilatus training planes and Emerr planes, there were dalali allegations,” said Mr. Parrikar at the meeting which was organised to honor Indian armed forces for the surgical strikes last month.
"The BJP government does not know these words and, therefore, we have no interest in using Indian army's credit for political purposes. We can see the performance of the Indian army over the last 65 years," he said.
Referring to what he called “some treacherous people in politics,” Mr. Parrikar advised them not to politicise sacrifices of the Army.
“But we will tell people that Modi government has done what for 25 years, the political leadership was struggling to do,"Mr. Parrikar said.
" The chaos which our neighbouring country is in is proof enough for surgical operations. People of this country do not ask for proof of surgical operations,” said Mr. Parrikar.
