New Delhi, July 30: Taking a dig at the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government over new airports constructed since they came to power, senior Congress leader P Chidambaram said that "to boast and exaggerate are its hallmarks" while Union Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia hit back on the same coin, saying "fact-checking isn't current Congress' strong suit."

The war of words between the Union Minister and Senior Congress leader started with the latter alleging that “the claims of the government that they had built "74 airports in the last 7 years" are hollow and untrue” adding that only 11 airports were built since May 2014. 'Phool Barsana Band Karo': Jyotiraditya Scindia Tries to Stop BJP Worker Adamant on Showering Flowers on Him, Video Goes Viral.

Launching an attack against Chidambaram’s allegations, Union Minister Scindia listed the details of airports that were built, under construction and other schemes of the Central government adding that “the government under the visionary leadership of Prime Minister Modi has “operationalised” 74 airports, some of which had been lying unutilized for decades & were national liabilities, thanks to zero initiative taken by the previous UPA govts!”

“The 74 "airports" include 9 helicopter stations and two waterdromes. The waterdromes closed down soon after the 'inauguration'! Out of the 74 "airports", 15 are no longer in use because there are no flights! The BJP-NDA government launched 479 new "routes". Out of these, 225 are no longer in operation!”, shared Chidambaram in a tweet. India Will Have 200–220 More Airports, Heliports and Water Aerodromes in Next 5 Years, Union Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia.

While, in his response, Scindia said, “These developments have involved incurring unprecedented capital investment - almost Rs 75000 crore in the last 10 years - which is directly linked to the growth of employment in the country and has a deep social impact apart from meeting the growing aspirations of all the strata of the society to undertake air travel. What earlier governments failed to achieve in 70 years has been achieved in merely 9 years!”

Scindia further said that Chidambaram has been hit by desperation for survival. “@PChidambaram_INJi, clearly, fact-checking is not the current Congress’ strong suit. Desperation for survival and relevance has hit senior discerning leaders such as yourself. Please do not perpetuate half-baked truths!”, he said.

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)