A new report from the French portal Mediapart claims French aircraft manufacturer Dassault paid at least 7.5 million euros, nearly 650 million, in bribes to a middleman to help secure the sale of 36 Rafale fighter jets to India, and Indian agencies failed to investigate despite the presence of documents.
The online publication has been looking into allegations of corruption in the Rafale deal, which is worth $59,000 crore and published the latest report on Sunday, November 7.
According to Mediapart, Dassault paid secret commissions to alleged middleman Sushen Gupta. Despite the existence of these documents, the Indian federal police have decided not to pursue
the case and have not opened an investigation, according to the portal. The CBI and the Enforcement Directorate have had proof that Dassault paid kickbacks to Sushen Gupta to secure the sale of Rafale jets since October 2018,
says the report.
“It involves offshore companies, dubious contracts and ‘false’ invoices. Mediapart can reveal that detectives from India’s federal police force, the Central Bureau
of Investigations (CBI) and colleagues from the Enforcement Directorate (ED), which fights money laundering, have had proof since October 2018 that Dassault paid at least €7.5 million in secret commissions to middleman
Sushen Gupta,” Mediapart reported.
According to the report, the evidence is contained in confidential documents discovered during the investigation of another corruption case involving the supply of VVIP choppers by Agusta
Westland.
Mediapart claimed that a French judge had been appointed to lead an investigation into allegations of "corruption and favouritism" in the deal.
The online journal in an April 2021 report asserted to have documents showing Dassault and its industrial partner Thales paid "middleman" Gupta several million euros in "secret
commissions" in connection with the deal.
The majority of the payments were made before 2013, according to the April report. "An entity called 'D,' which is a code he regularly used to designate Dassault, paid €14.6
million to Interdev in Singapore over the period 2004-2013," according to an accounts spreadsheet belonging to Sushen Gupta.
On October 11, 2018, the documents were sent to the CBI, just a week after the agency received an official complaint alleging corruption in the Rafale deal. "However, despite receiving
information proving that secret commissions had indeed been paid just seven days after that corruption complaint was filed, the CBI decided not to open an investigation," Mediapart stated.
"Thales paid €2.4 million to another shell company, as per another accounts spreadsheet belonging to Gupta, which only covers the years 2004 to 2008," reported portal.
In another April report, Mediapart claimed that Dassault paid Gupta €1 million for building 50 large replica Rafale jets, despite the planemaker providing inspectors from the French
anti-corruption agency Agence Française Anticorruption with no proof that the models were built.
Rafale deal
A deal of Rs 59,000-crore was signed by the NDA government on September 23, 2016, to procure 36 Rafale jets from French aerospace firm Dassault Aviation after an about seven-year exercise
to procure 126 Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) for the Indian Air Force which couldn’t get a nod during the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) rule.
The Congress party accused the government of massive breaches in the deal and alleged that the centre was procuring each aircraft at a price of more than Rs 1,670 crore as against Rs 526
crore which was settled by the UPA government during the negotiations for the MMRCA.
The Congress had raised several doubts about the aircraft deal before the Lok Sabha elections in 2019, all the corruption charges were declined by the government.