Air Force pilots to fly French Rafales over Indian skies this week

New Delhi: At a time when the Congress is attempting to rake up the allegations of scam in the Rs 60,000 crore Rafale deal for 36 planes, French Air Force pilots would fly into the country with their Rafales and land at a premier air base in central India where our own pilots would also get to fly these planes.

Three French Air Force Rafales would be making a stopover at the Gwalior air base on their return to France, after participating in the multinational Exercise Pitch Black in Australia held over the last fortnight. The Indian Air Force had also participated in the war games with its transport aircraft and the Su-30MKI combat aircraft, sources in the Air Force said.

“During the exchange programme plan starting today, the French Air Force pilots would be flying the upgraded versions of the Mirage-2000 aircraft of the Indian Air Force while our pilots would be flying in their Rafale planes. This will give some experience to our pilots till the time our 36 Rafales start arriving in the country,” the sources said.

The Indian Air Force is expecting to get the first of its 36 Rafales only in September 2019, while the remaining would take another couple of years more to be delivered. The 36 Rafales would be divided into two squadrons and one each would be deployed in Ambala in Haryana and Hashimara air base in Bengal for operations.

The Gwalior air base has been the home for the French-origin Mirage-2000 aircraft for more than three decades now and proved to be the game-changers in the Kargil conflict of 1999 where they accurately took out Pakistan Army soldiers who had been attacking Indian positions hiding on mountain tops in the Kargil-Drass sector.

The Congress has been raising allegations that there is a scam in the acquisition of the 36 Rafales by the Modi government, and particular industrialists were favoured by the administration by awarding them offsets contracts.

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