It is now an established fact: the Indian government of ultra-nationalist prime minister Narendra Modi is keen to bury at all costs the corruption case concerning the sale of 36 Dassault-built Rafale fighter jets to India. This enormous 7.8-billion-euro state-to-state contract was concluded between France and India in 2016.
According to Mediapart's information, the Indian government has de facto refused to comply with a formal request for international cooperation on the case that was made in November 2022 by the two French judges in charge of the criminal investigation into suspected “corruption”, “influence peddling” and “favouritism”.
What makes the situation even worse is the fact that rather than officially refusing this request, India's Ministry of Home Affairs has instead decided to ignore it, reportedly driving the French Embassy in India to distraction for eight months before ending all communication. Eventually the French ambassador to India Emmanuel Lenain (who is now France's ambassador to Brazil) felt compelled to write a diplomatic note on the issue. That report has been seen by Mediapart.
Contacted by Mediapart, the Indian government's communications service and India's Ministry of Home Affairs did not respond.
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The French and Indian governments are now united in their desire to slow down a highly-sensitive investigation that could implicate three heads of state or government: Narendra Modi, French president Emmanuel Macron and his predecessor at the Élysée François Hollande (see here and here). In France the investigating judges have faced two refusals to declassify secret documents, many of which they came across during a search of French defence and aviation company Dassault.
In fact, the whole case got off to a very bad start. In 2019 Éliane Houlette, who was then head of France's financial crimes prosecution unit the Parquet National Financier (PNF), dismissed an initial complaint from French anti-corruption NGO Sherpa without carrying out a full investigation - and against the advice of one of her deputies - in order to “preserve France's interests”. It was not until June 2021 that a judge-led investigation was finally opened, thanks to a second complaint by Sherpa acting on revelations in Mediapart's 'Rafale Papers' investigation.
Mediapart's revelations were based on documents from an Indian judicial process involving another corruption case, which concerns the sale of helicopters. In investigating the influential Indian intermediary Sushen Gupta, India's federal police force, the Central Bureau of Investigations (CBI), and colleagues from the Enforcement Directorate (ED), which combats money laundering, discovered that the same Sushen Gupta had received 12.8 million euros in secret commissions from Dassault, via a system of allegedly bogus invoices.
In one note, Gupta says that he had given money to “people … in office” to help facilitate the sale of the Rafale jets to India. But this information, revealed by Mediapart, has never been used by Indian investigators, as confirmed last month in an investigation by the magazine The Caravan.
In October 2018 the French investigating judges issued a request for international cooperation, in order to get the Indian authorities to send them these judicial documents concerning Dassault and Sushen Gupta.
The French judges also asked for two searches to be carried out, at which they want to be present: one in the offices of one of Gupta's companies, the other at the headquarters of Dassault Reliance Aerospace Limited (DRAL). This is the joint company created by Dassault and the Reliance group, which is run by billionaire Anil Ambani. He is a close friend of prime minister Narendra Modi – the company was reportedly imposed on Dassault as its partner by the Indian government.
Many cases are handled by our Indian partners with very long delays, often in an incomplete manner.
The French ambassador in New Delhi took the case very seriously. On November 28th 2022 the embassy's domestic security attaché went in person to the Ministry of Home Affairs to meet the liaison judge in charge of international cooperation, and handed over the request from the French judges. It was also sent to the ministry by courier a few days later.
The Indian liaison judge did not get back in touch for two months. Then on February 6th 2023 he informed the French authorities that he had been moved to another position and was not being immediately replaced.
The French ambassador, Emmanuel Lemain, became impatient. On April 6th his second in command and his domestic security attaché managed to meet the Ministry of Home Affairs director in charge of international affairs, accompanied by the person in charge of Franco-Indian relations at India's Ministry of External Affairs. The two officials promised that they would respond to the French judges' request “as soon as possible”.
On April 24th the French Embassy learnt that a new liaison judge in charge of requests for cooperation on criminal cases had finally been appointed by the Ministry of Home Affairs. “After being contacted, the latter has never responded to our requests. Yet his appointment was confirmed by the Ministry of Home Affairs in an email on July 20th 2023 which was received by the domestic security attaché who once again sought to contact this judge,” said ambassador Emmanuel Lemain in his diplomatic report.
“In conclusion, this case illustrates the difficulty of cooperation on criminal cases with India. Many cases are handled by our Indian partners with very long delays, often in an incomplete manner,” the ambassador added in his report on July 25th, suggesting that the French government used the opportunity of the forthcoming G20 anti-corruption summit on August 11th and 12th in Kolkata to try to “advance certain cases”.
This case illustrates in particular the desire of the Modi government – a desire largely shared in Paris – to make sure that the French judicial investigation into corruption over the sale of the Rafale jets does not reach an outcome. The result is that the investigating judges face a major hurdle, as they lack both the classified French documents and the Indian judicial documents which prove the payment of secret commissions.
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- The original French version of this article can be read here.
English version by Michael Streeter