Rafale fighters: Defence Acquisition Council to take up 36-jet deal in next meeting

Ending the deadlock over the Rafale deal with France, Minister of State for Defence Rao Inderjit Singh said 35-aircraft deal is in final stages.

Giving out an official statement on 19 April for the first time, Rao said that most of the hitches have been addressed and few remaining issues will be resolved in the next meeting of the Defence Acquisition Council (DAC).

"I can only tell you that so far most of the hitches that were there had been addressed. A few (other) things will be addressed when possibly the matter comes before the DAC in the next meeting and thereafter I think the road shall be clear," Singh told reporters on the sidelines of a joint Air Force-CII seminar on Make in India.

"Today Rafale is our necessity, while LCA is entirely different from Rafael; we need both. We are trying to invest our resources in right manner so as to make our air force more capable," he added.

In January, India and France signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for the purchase of Rafale fighter aircraft.

The French-made single-seater aircraft is known as one of the smartest fighter jets in the world. The Rafale was competing with five other planes made by Russia, Sweeden and the US before getting the approval from Indian authority.

According to reports, 36 Rafales will cost a little over Rs 65,000 crore and effort is on to bring down the price to less than Euros Rs 59,000 crore.