The French Council of the Muslim Faith hailed the ruling as a "victory for common sense".
'It is not clear how the NDA government -- including Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, backed by senior IAF officials -- claimed that the 36 Rafale contract with Dassault in 2016 cost the IAF 20% less than Dassault's 126 Rafale offer,' notes Ajai Shukla in the first of a three-part series.
Minister of State for Defence Subhash Bhamre said the cost of each Rafale aircraft is approximately Rs 670 crore.
The political row over the Rafale deal intensified on Tuesday with the Congress and Bharatiya Janata Party trading barbs over it.
Why did Modi bypass the Cabinet before he committed India to the Rafale deal?
The Tour de France continued in a low-key but defiant mood under heightened security on Friday, with riders, spectators and race officials observing a minute's silence for the scores of victims of the Bastille Day attack in Nice.
The defence ministry stressed that the purchase of 36 Rafales was 'strictly in accordance with the Defence Procurement Procedure in all aspects.' However, the DPP-mandated process had not been gone through when Modi announced the agreement on April 10, 2015,' observes Ajai Shukla.
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