Deal not better: Three officials dissented

The CAG report details emerged even as a report in ‘The Hindu’ on Wednesday said at least three senior Defence Ministry officials among the seven-member Indian Negotiating Team were of the view that the final price offered by the French Government cannot be considered as 'better terms' compared to the deal under the UPA.

The latest report cites the dissent note signed off by three domain experts on the Indian team - MP Singh, Adviser (Cost), a Joint Secretary-level officer from the Indian Cost Accounts Service; AR Sule, Financial Manager (Air); and Rajeev Verma, Joint Secretary and Acquisitions Manager (Air). The eight-page note was written more than a month after the team's negotiations with the French side were completed and three months before the inter-governmental agreement was signed, on September 23, 2016. The deal had been announced by PM Modi during a visit to France in 2015.

"Commenting on the final Euro 7.87 billion cost of the new Rafale deal, the domain experts stated that 'the reasonability of price offered by the French Government is not established. Even the final price offered by the French Government cannot be considered as 'better terms' compared to the MMRCA [medium multirole combat aircraft] offer and is therefore not meeting the requirement of the Joint Statement'," the report said.

According to the experts, the final price offered by the French government was 55.6 per cent above the benchmark decided in advance and "5.3 per cent higher than the Aligned Cost of the commercial quotes" in the Congress-era deal.

They also noted that Eurofighter Typhoon fighter jet, which too had qualified for the contract, would have turned out to be much cheaper.