Defence System

France’s entrenched interests stack the odds against the new Rafale investigation

- NOOPUR TIWARI

The deluge of revelations in France about suspected corruption in the Rafale deal began in 2018 with a seemingly unlikely protagonist—Julie Gayet, an actor and the partner of the former French president François Hollande. Word got out that, some two and a half years earlier, the Indian businessman Anil Ambani had stepped in as a patron for one of Gayet’s films. Just days after Ambani's generous gesture, Hollande, on a state visit to India, signed a memorandum of understanding for the delivery of 36 Rafale fighter jets, built by the French defence manufacturer Dassault Aviation. As part of the deal, worth a reported €7.87 billion, half of the purchase value was to be re-invested in India. Ambani’s debt-ridden Reliance Group, which had only the barest experience in defence manufacturing and none at all in aviation, emerged as the main beneficiary of this “offset.”

There was a flurry of denials that these events had any connection, but Hollande’s line of defence was hardly ideal. Speaking to Mediapart, the French outlet behind many key disclosures about the Rafale deal, he said that the financing for Gayet’s project could only have been a coincidence, since the offset partner had been proposed by the Indian government. This added fuel to another burning question: was the Indian government, under Narendra Modi, guilty of favouring an undeserving party as a beneficiary?