Defence Acquisition Council directs Rafale committee to submit report 'expeditiously'

NEW DELHI: The Defence Ministry's top acquisition body today reviewed the much-hyped multi-billion Euro Rafale deal and directed the committee negotiating it to submit its report "expeditiously".

Strategic partnership for the submarine sector was also discussed during the meeting of the Defence Acquisition Council (DAC).

The Rafale committee briefed the DAC about the progress made in the deal.

The DAC, chaired by Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar, directed the committee to submit its report expeditiously, defence sources said.

However, no final decisions were taken.

It was earlier expected that a final decision could be taken on the Rafale deal at the Ministry level today, but it seems there would be another review by the DAC on the issue soon.

As per the normal process, once a deal has been cleared by Defence Ministry, the file goes to the Finance Ministry and then to the Cabinet Committee on Security for final clearance.

In an interview to PTI in May, Parrikar had said he was looking at wrapping up the deal soon and this could mean by end of June or July.

Rejecting suggestions that there has been a delay in signing the contract for the nearly 7.89 billion euro deal to procure the French fighter planes, the Minister said any such process takes at least 6-8 months.

The deal was announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in April last year during his visit to France when he said India would purchase 36 Rafale jets in a government-to-government contract.

Soon after the announcement, the Defence Ministry scrapped a separate process that was on to purchase 126 Rafale fighter planes, built by French defence giant Dassault Aviation.

The current deal comes with the clause of delivering 50 per cent offsets, creating business worth at least 3 billion Euros for smaller Indian companies and generating thousands of new jobs in India through the offsets.

The commercial negotiations, as in the pricing of the planes, equipment and other issues, actually began only in mid-January this year.