Supreme court declares that there are no irregularities in the Rafale jet purchases

Sabareesh Pillay | School of Law, University of Mumbai Thane Sub-Campus | 23rd August 2020

Manohar Lal Sharma Vs Narendra Damodardas Modi

FACTS:

In this case, the petitioners Advocates Prashant Bhushan, Manohar Lal and Vineet Dhanda filed a case and raised questions about the new deal of purchases of the rafale fighter jet. This case is also known as the rafale fighter jet case. In 2007 the UPA government were in talks to buy 126 rafale fighter jets from France but the process was taking a long time and was eventually delayed. In 2015, as the new government came, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the French President signed a new deal. In the new deal only 36 rafale jets were to be purchased which was comparatively less than the previous deal and the cost of the deal is Rs.  60,000 Crore. Furthering this allegation, Reliance group which is a private company was made partner along with dassault for the making of the fighter jets. The issue pointed out by the petitioners were the changes in prices comparing the old and new rafale deal, procedural irregularity and the selection of a private company-reliance for the joint venture.

ISSUE:

Whether the procedure followed by the Central Government in purchasing 36 Fighter Aircraft in place of 126 Aircraft leads to procedural irregularity and whether the per unit price the rafale jet deal is significantly more than  the previous UPA deal. Lastly, whether the procedure of appointing the private reliance company as partner with Dassault in accordance with the guidelines of defence. 

PETITIONER CONTENTION:

The petitioner contented that the appointment of Anil Ambani’s reliance company as a partner with dassault is suspicious and whether it was done with complete scrutiny or not. Further, there was concern over the pricing irregularity of the deal and in comparison with the previous deal the cost of the deal was extremely high bringing in the question of whether the deal was corrupt and if the stakeholders had something to gain from it.

RESPONDENT CONTENTION:

The respondent team of attorney general KK Venugopal and ASG Tushar Mehta that there is no question of irregularity and correct procedure was followed by the government while making and completing the deal. They added that the purchase of 36 fighter jets were made in accordance to the market prices and that all the allegations of corruption are bogus. Further they added that the deal was well negotiated and there is a commercial advantage in the deal.

JUDGEMENT:

The bench comprising of Justice Ranjan Gogoi, Justice K.M. Joseph and Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul gave the judgment that the Court cannot interfere so much in the matter of Defence contracts as it has a little scope of judicial scrutiny in it. The court said that in the interest of sovereignty and integrity of India, the scope of judicial review is restricted especially in the defence matters and the purchase of Rafale fighter aircraft is also the matter of national security contracts. The court said that the deal does not have any irregularities and the allegations of corruption have no evidence to go with it.  Further the court said that the previous deal made during the UPA government fell through due to unsolved terms and was taken back in 2015 thus, this was a completely new deal which was made during the NDA government  for 36 Rafale fighter jets. 

CONCLUSION:

With this judgement the court declared that there were no irregularities and this was a completely valid deal and further allegations against this deal will not be entertained. When a review petition was filed against the judgement, the court said that there was no error from their part and the petition was dismissed. This put an end to the whole matter.