Rafale Deal: Mediapart's report accuses Indian Middlemen of taking bribe of Rs. 65 crore in the Rafale Deal
When The Rafale deal was cracked, it received applause from the whole country but at the same time it gave rise to questions about corruption in the deal. An online publication of france Mediapart has made another claim about the deal. While publishing a fake invoice, it alleged that the manufacturer of Rafale- Dassault Aviation, gave Rs. 65 Crore to Indian Middleman Sushen Gupta to make the deal successful. It further claimed that Central Bureau of Investigation and Enforcement Directorate were aware of this but they didn’t take any action.
The report further said that despite having all the documents, the two agencies of India decided not to take the matter further.
India had cracked the deal with France to procure 36 Rafale Fighter Jets at the price of Rs. 69 crore. The Mediapart’s report claimed that CBI and ED have all the proofs since October 2018. Dassault has paid at least Rs. 65 crore to middleman Sushen Gupta.
This is not the first time when Rafale deal has gave rise to accusations of corruption. 5 months earlier, Mediapart had claimed that in order to investigate the deal, a French Justice was appointed. Mediapart said that CBI received complaint about possible corruption in Rafale deal om October 4, 2018. After a week, it received the documents of secret bribe but despite of this CBI didn’t choose to investigate.
Dassault had deployed Sushen Gupta in 2001 as a middleman when India had decided to buy the Rafale Jets. However the process to procure them started 6 years later in 2007. It is being said that Sushen Gupta was also involved in Augusta Westland Case.
The report published by Mediapart has also exposed that according to the documents of ED, Sushen Gupta has said that many Indian officials also received bribe from Dassault for the Rafale deal. Also, in 2015, when the deal was in the last phase, Sushen Gupta procured some secretive documents from the Ministry of Defence.
The Narendra Modi led NDA government signed a deal with French Aerospace Company Dassault on September 23, 2016 to procure 36 Rafale Jets.
