Congress President Rahul Gandhi on Monday accused Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman of "lying" about the contracts given to HAL and challenged Prime Minister Narendra Modi for a debate on the Rafale deal.

Describing Sitharaman as a "spokesperson of Narendra Modi", he said only contracts worth Rs 26,570 crore have been given to the public sector Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd and not Rs 1 lakh crore "as stated" by the Minister while replying to a debate in the Lok Sabha last week on the deal to purchase fighter jets from France.