Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said there was no confusion about the promised UAE aid of Rs 700 crore. The chief minister said the conversation about the disaster assistance had taken place between two individuals—prime minister Narendra Modi and Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed bin Sultan Al-Nahyan, the crown prince of Abu Dhabi and the deputy supreme commander of UAE's Armed Forces. “In fact, both of them had even disclosed this to the world,” the chief minister said.
Pinarayi Vijayan said the crown prince told about the offer to Gulf-based Malayali businessman M.A. Yusuf Ali when the latter visited the prince to offer him Bakrid greetings.
“When Yusuf Ali told me about this offer, I had asked him whether we can go public with this. Ali told me that there was no issue as the prince himself had told him,” Pinarayi Vijayan said.
In a sarcastic vein, he added: “Hope all of you had seen the prime minister's tweet? Or should I show it to you again?” The chief minister was referring to the prime minister's tweet on August 18.
“A big thanks to @hhshkmohd for his gracious offer to support people of Kerala during this difficult time. His concern reflects the special ties between governments and people of India and UAE,” Modi had tweeted in response to UAE vice president Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum's flurry of tweets expressing his love for Kerala and his offer to help the state that had contributed greatly to the growth of the UAE.
Though the prime minister was appreciative of the UAE's willingness to help, and the Kerala chief minister had made the offer public, the Centre had later taken the position that it had not received any official intimation of the offer from the UAE.
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It was stated that the country, as a matter of policy, did not accept aid from other nations.
Amid the confusion, the UAE has on Thursday stated that it was yet to make any official offer and had not fixed any amount as financial aid.
The UAE's ambassador to India, Ahmed Albanna, said what the UAE had actually meant was that it had formed a committee to arrive at the amount of assistance to be passed on to Kerala.
Chief minister Pinarayi Vjayan had earlier said he would hold discussions with officials at the Centre to sort out the foreign aid issue. “If need be I will talk to the Prime Minister also,” he said.
The Kerala chief minister said whether to accept the assistance or not was the country's internal issue. In other words, he was saying that the country cannot deny that such an offer was not made.