Rafale, the fighter with 7 lives

ai r c r af t were t e c hnicall y accepted without evaluating the significant enhancements made on them”. They shouldn’t have been, so this techniocally counts as a fifth life.

The remaining four planes were rejected. CAG report said the commercial offers of Rafale and Eurofighter -- the bids were opened in 2011 -- were non-compliant with the RFP and liable for rejection as non-responsive bids during price evaluation. It said the prices offered by the two vendors were not “firm and fixed” and were subject to escalation. “It was specifically mentioned in the RFP that the submission of bids in incomplete format would render the offer liable for rejection,” the report said. Both bids should have been rejected but neither was; this was Rafale’s sixth life.

Experts maintained, however, that the Rafale and Eurofighter jets were better than the others in the fray.

“There may have been technical and pricing issues at different stages but Rafale and Eurofighter are of new generation jets and superior in capabilities to the other planes that took part in the contest,” said former Western Air Command chief Air Marshal PS Ahluwalia (retd).

Acc o r d i n g t o CAG, t h e defence ministry set up a panel in June 2012 to examine different aspects of the deal.

In its report submitted on March 27, 2015, the panel said Dassault was non-compliant with the RFP and its proposal should have been rejected at the TEC stage. It added that Dassault’s price bid was non-compliant and the determination of L1 (lowest bidder) was faulty. It said Dassault wasn’t L1 and the contract could not be concluded with it.

The audit found Dassault’s bid wanting on several counts – it did have the cost breakdown of the seven mandatory components to determine life-cycle cost and did not quote capital expenditure for licensed production of fighters in India. “Parity was not maintained in evaluation of Dassault and EADS bids on the element of direct cost of acquisition,” the report said.

This was the seventh life.