Rafale deal: Dassault paid 1 million euro as 'gift' to Indian middleman, French report reveals

Rafale fighter

French aircraft manufacturer Dassault Aviation SA, which makes the Rafale fighter jets, had paid one million euros (Rs 8.62 crore) to an Indian middleman, while finalising the Rafale deal with India, French anti-corruption authority Agence Francaise Anticorruption has found out.

An NDTV report quoting the AFA said: “As they (investigating agencies) combed through the 2017 accounts, the AFA inspectors raised an eyebrow when they came across an item of expenditure costing 508,925 euros and entered under the heading ‘gifts to clients’.”

The amount reportedly went to Sushen Gupta, who runs Defsys Solutions -- one of the subcontractors of Dassault in India.

Gupta is currently being investigated by the Central Bureau of Investigation and the Enforcement Directorate over alleged graft in the AgustaWestland deal. He was arrested but is currently out on bail.

French journal Mediapart reported on April 4 that Dassault tried to get away with the “larger than usual gift” by producing an invoice dated March 30, 2017, from Defsys Solutions. As per the invoice, Defsys was paid 50 percent of the order worth 1,017,850 euros to manufacture 50 dummies of the Rafale jets.

The report published by the French journal added: “The company said the money was used to pay for the manufacture of 50 large replica models of Rafale jets, even though the inspectors were given no proof that these models were made.”

However, Dassault could not furnish documentary evidence of the models or explain why the expense was listed as a “gift to clients”.