Putting a brave face despite the multi-billion dollar Rafale fighter jet contract flowing into rough weather, France today claimed that everything is going “normal”.
Interestingly, the French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius will not be raising the issue of the much delayed Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) during his three day visit beginning tomorrow.
“Clearly the defence procurement is not part of the agenda of this visit,” said French sources refusing to comment on the Rafale deal.
Asked again, the sources said exchanges between French and Indian side continues. “Everything is at its normal path,” they said.
India has made it clear that the ball is in France’s court on the signing of the contract.
India is insisting that Dassault Aviation, which manufactures Rafale, cannot renege on the Request for Proposal (RFP) clauses, which it had initially agreed to.
They say France must stick to the price that it had quoted in the RFP and guarantee clause under which Dassault has to stand guarantee for the planes that would be manufactured by state-owned HAL.
Comments
Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.
We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of TheHindu Businessline and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.