BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra has said that Congress President Rahul Gandhi was like Alibaba, who was surrounded with chalis chor (forty thieves). Speaking to media at the BJP headquarters, the BJP spokesperson said that the Congress president, who accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of being a thief, himself was neck-deep in corruption.
Patra said, “Mr Rahul Gandhi is embroiled personally, individually in corruption cases. From today, I would say that Alibaba Chalis Chor machaye chaukidar ka shor. (Alibaba forty thieves raises the slogan of Chaukidar).”
Patra was referring to Gandhi’s jibe Chaukidar hi chor hai (The watchman is thief), targeted at Modi for his alleged involvement in the questionable Rafale deal. Patra quoted a newspaper report saying that Gandhi and his sister had rented their property to scam-accused Jignesh Shah, alleging that the money earned went directly into the Congress president’s account.
He said, “We have come to know that there is a lavish farmhouse of 4.69 acre in Delhi’s Mehrauli area in the name of Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi. The property was rented to Shah, owner of Financial Technologies Ltd, in February 2013 at Rs. 7 lakh per month.”
Patra said that henceforth he would call Gandhi as Alibaba, popular character from story One Thousand and One Nights from Arabian Nights.
A report by Indian Express on Monday had said that Rahul Gandhi, then Congress vice president and sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra had rented their 4.69-acre farmhouse in Delhi to Jignesh Shah-promoted Financial Technologies (India) Ltd in early 2013 when the Congress-led UPA government was investigating National Spot Exchange Ltd (NSEL), a company promoted by FTIL, for alleged market irregularities.
The Congress said that the UPA at the Centre and the Cong-NCP government in Maharashtra had, in fact, taken “decisive civil and criminal action” against FTIL, Shah and other entities associated with him. These included Shah’s arrest.
