World

FRENCH President Macron Says Rafale Deal With India Was Inked “When I Was Not In Office’’

FRENCH President Emmanuel Macron has said that the Rafale deal was a “government-to-government” discussion and he was not in power when the multi-billion-dollar agreement for 36 fighter jets was signed between India and France. He was replying to questions by media people on the sidelines of the ongoing UN General Assembly session at New York, Macron, 40. Media asked him if the Indian government had at any point told France or Dassault Aviation, the French aerospace major, that they had to accept Reliance as the Indian partner for the Rafale deal. India had inked an inter-governmental agreement with France in September last year for procurement of 36 Rafale fighter jets at a cost of around Rs 58,000 crore, nearly one-and-half years after Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the proposal during a visit to Paris. The delivery of the jets is scheduled to begin from September, 2019. “I will be very clear. It was a government-to-government agreement. India had inked an inter-governmental agreement with France in September last year for procurement of 36 Rafale fighter jets at a cost of about INR  58,000 crore  after Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the proposal during a visit to Paris. The delivery of the jets is scheduled to begin from September, 2019. I will be very clear. It was a government-to-government discussion and I just want to refer to what Prime Minister (Narendra) Modi very clearly said a few days ago,” Macron added. “I don’t have any other comment. I was not in charge at that time and I know that we have very clear rules,” he said in his first comment on the issue.

Macron, who assumed the presidency in May last year, emphasised that this is a government-to-government discussion and “this contract is part of a broader framework which is military and defence” coalition between India and France.

“This one is very important to me because this is a strategic” coalition and not just an industrial relation. “That is my point. I just want to refer to what PM Modi said on this situation,” he said. A huge controversy over the Rafale deal has erupted in India after a report in the French media quoted former president Francois Hollande as saying that the selection of the Indian company in the Rafale deal was done at the “behest of New Delhi”.Hollande said that “the Indian government proposed Reliance Defence as partner” for the French aerospace giant and France did not have a choice. The report quoted Hollande as saying, “It was the Indian government that proposed this service group, and Dassault which negotiated with Ambani. We had no choice, we took the interlocutor who was given to us.” Prime Minister Modi had announced the procurement of a batch of 36 Rafale jets after holding talks with then French president Hollande on April 10, 2015 in Paris. The final deal was sealed on September 23, 2016.In its statement, Dassault Aviation said the contract for supply of 36 Rafale jets is a government-to-government agreement, adding “It provides for a separate contract in which Dassault Aviation commits to make compensation investments (offsets) in India worth 50 per cent of the value of the purchase.”

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