Latest on CAG report: Rafales '2.86% cheaper'

32 pages devoted to Rafale deal; price of jets 'masked'

Last updated: February 13, 2019 | 22:22

6 MIN READ

Dassault Rafale is a French twin-engine, canard delta wing, multirole fighter aircraft designed and built by Dassault Aviation. Equipped with a wide range of weapons, the Rafale is intended to perform air supremacy, interdiction, aerial reconnaissance, ground support, in-depth strike, anti-ship strike and nuclear deterrence missions. The Rafale is referred to as an "omnirole" aircraft by Dassault.

Reuters

India's Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) audit of Indian Air Force, for purchases covers the 2012-2017 period, was tabled at the Rajya Sabha, the upper house of the Indian Parliament, on Wednesday.
Five of the 11 deals audited were linked during the previous Congress-led (United Progressive Alliance) goverment and six from the present (BJP-led National Democratic Alliance, NDA) government
CAG has redacted pricing details for the Rafale deal; instead, it has mentioned only percentage terms
In 10 other acquisitions by the IAF, the auditor has mentioned the prices while evaluating these deals

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The office of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG), created by the Constitution Act of 1950, is accountable to the Indian Parliament, the people’s representatives.

CAG’s primary task is to audit financial transactions of the Union and State governments and Union territories.

On Wednesday, the CAG’s much-anticipated report on India's 36-aircraft Rafale deal with Dassault of France was tabled in the Rajya Sabha (Council of States), the upper house of the Parliament of India.

The report includes scrutiny of the pricing details, which was "masked".

The bottomline: A 2.86 per cent reduction in price for the Rafale deal, according to CAG.

Still, the most controversial point — pricing — has been "redacted". It was claimed that the details cannot be revealed on grounds of national security.

Rafale jets in formation. Regarding the selection of offset partner, the government said that there is no mention of any private business house in the inter-governmental agreement

The report states that compared to the 2007 deal signed by the Congress-led UPA government, the Rafale deal was signed by the Modi government in 2016 at a slightly lower price — 2.86 per cent lower.

India's Economic Times posted a picture of Table 5 purportedly taken from the report.

The table displays "Item-wise Cost Analysis". It was priced in million euros. The four columns — where it's supposed to show the price, were empty. Only the fifth column, showing a percentage increase/decrease was filled.

And that's how the overall savings figure of 2.86% was arrived at.

An item-wise cost analysis prepared by CAG, with price in million euros — but the "contracted price" column (5) is blank. Only the sixth column, showing positive/negative percentage of variation, was filled.

Latest on CAG report: Rafales '2.86% cheaper'

Following are the key points contained in the CAG report: