A row broke out between Tamil Nadu Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president K Annamalai and Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) leader and Minister for Electricity & Prohibition and Excise Senthil Balaji about the former’s expensive collector’s edition Rafale watch. In a series of tweets on Saturday, December 17, Minister Senthil Balaji asked how Annamalai “who claims to have only four goats as his sole property” had bought a watch made by the French company. Senthil Balaji also said in his tweets that there are only 500 watches in that edition, which cost more than Rs 5 lakh each. The minister also demanded that Annamalai publicise the receipt for the watch within an hour of his tweets. He further made a dig at the BJP president about his nationalism.
Rafale refers to the fighter aircrafts made by the French company Dassault Aviation. The DMK minister’s tweets recall the controversy over the Rafale deal, after the BJP-led Union government purchased 36 twin-engine aircraft. Opposition parties, particularly the Congress, alleged that the cost of the aircraft far exceeded the Rs 58,000 crore disclosed by the BJP. There were also allegations about a lack of transparency in the deal and that the BJP was favouring Anil Ambani’s Reliance Defence Limited as India partner.
To respond to Senthil Balaji’s allegations, Annamalai held a press conference on Sunday. “The watch I’m wearing was made when India ordered aircraft from Rafale. It is made of parts from the aircraft. There are only 500 such watches. It is a collector’s edition called the Rafale special edition. I did not get an opportunity to fly the Rafale aircraft, so as a nationalist I’m wearing the watch,” the BJP president said. Annamalai also said that he would wear the watch “as long as there was life in him. Who else in the world will buy a Rafale watch? Only an Indian will. So, for the sake of our country, I’m wearing a watch produced by Dassault Aviation, made of parts from the Rafale aircraft, because I’m a nationalist. I’m not a person who speaks division.”
Annamalai also claimed that the “rules of war had changed after India got the Rafale aircraft,” adding, “this is why China is addressing us this way,” with reference to the growing border tensions between India and China. The BJP president, however, declined to comment on the controversy regarding the Rafale deal, saying the watch is a “personal matter”. He also claimed, “India’s enemies are within India, working as agents of Pakistan and China. But India is not like it was before. This is Modiji’s India. This is an India that can hit back would be my only answer.”
Senthil Balaji responded to the press conference via his Twitter account saying that Annamalai himself had reminded the people about the Rafale controversy. He also asked, “Is wearing a foreign-made watch worth several lakhs nationalism? Is this Make in India?” He further asked whether or not Annamalai can show the bill for the watch.
This is not the first time a row has broken out between the DMK minister and the BJP president. In October, Annamalai made a veiled jibe at Senthil Balaji as “toddy seller” and that he did not have to respond to comments made by the minister. As the Coimbatore blast had happened at the time, Senthil Balaji had said, “The police will name the guilty persons only after investigation. In such a scenario if a certain party’s leader knows even before the information has been released, the NIA should first investigate that BJP leader.”