By N. C. Bipindra
New Delhi: India has signed an INR 64,000-crore (~US$7.5 billion) government-to-government contract with France to buy 26 Rafale Marine fighter jets for the Indian Navy aircraft carriers INS Vikrant and INS Vikramaditya. Under the deal, French plane-maker Dassault Aviation shall build a fuselage production facility in India.
The Inter-Governmental Agreement (IGA) was signed by India’s Minister of Defence Rajnath Singh and France’s Minister of Armed Forces Sebastien Lecornu remotely on Apr. 28, 2025, in New Delhi, according to India’s Ministry of Defence (MoD) statement.
A previously planned visit by the French defence minister for the contract signing was rescheduled due to his health. Hence, the two ministers joined the ceremony remotely. The contracts, signed by each minister, were taken to New Delhi and Paris, respectively, through diplomatic courier for the formal signing ceremony, it is learned.
The MoD said the 22 single-seater and four twin-seater aircraft procurement for the Indian Navy would include Training, Simulators, Associated Equipment, Weapons, and Performance-Based Logistics. It would also include additional equipment for the existing Indian Air Force (IAF) Rafale fleet.
Signed agreements, aircraft package supply protocol, and weapons package supply protocol were exchanged by Indian and French officials in the presence of Defence Secretary Rajesh Kumar Singh, French Ambassador to India Dr. Thierry Mathou and Indian Navy’s Vice Chief Vice Admiral K Swaminathan at the Indian Navy’s headquarters at Nausena Bhawan, New Delhi.
The agreement includes Transfer of Technology for the integration of indigenous weapons in India in line with the Indian Narendra Modi government’s thrust on ‘Aatmanirbhar Bharat,’ the statement added.
“It also includes setting up a production facility for Rafale fuselage and Maintenance, Repair, and Overhaul (MRO) facilities for aircraft engines, sensors, and weapons in India. The deal is expected to generate thousands of jobs and revenue for several MSMEs in setting up, producing, and running these facilities.”
France’s Dassault Aviation‘s Rafale Marine is a carrier-borne combat-ready aircraft with proven operational capabilities in the maritime environment. The Rafale Marine fleet induction by 2030 would include crew training in France and India.
The Rafale Marine’s commonality with the Rafale being operated by the IAF would substantially enhance joint operational capability, optimising training and logistics for the aircraft for both the Indian Navy and the IAF.
“The induction would lead to the addition of a potent force multiplier to the Indian Navy’s aircraft carriers, substantially boosting the nation’s air power at sea,” the MoD said.
Dassault Aviation and the Indian MoD also entered into a separate contract for the fuselage production facility, signed by MoD’s Joint Secretary (Maritime Systems) Dinesh Kumar and Dassault Aviation chief executive officer Eric Trappier.
MoD officials said the Indian Navy would get the first Rafale Marine aircraft in 2028, three years from the contract date. By 2030, India would have 62 Rafale fighters in its naval and air force fleet, including the 36 aircraft procured for the IAF under a 2016 contract.
It is now widely speculated that IAF would choose Rafale to meet its additional requirements of 114 combat aircraft under what is now commonly called the Multi-Role Fighter Aircraft (MRFA) acquisition programme for which a tender is being prepared at the MoD.
Officials said the training, simulator, associated equipment, weapons, and Performance-Based Logistics (PBL) period for 22 Rafale M single-seater and four Rafale D twin-seater jets would be five years. The IGA also includes additional equipment for the existing IAF Rafale fleet.
Officials also noted that Indian weapons, including the ASTRA Mk1 Air-to-Air Beyond Visual Range Missiles, would be integrated through an Indian partner under the contract. They said Dassault Aviation would showcase a Rafale Marine aircraft with India-specific enhancements, including strengthened undercarriage, helmet-mounted displays, and a few others, in the next 18 months.
The Rafale Marines would operate off the flight deck of two Indian Aircraft Carriers, currently using Russian-origin MiG-29K jets with a poor performance and availability record due to frequent engine troubles. Officials said MiGs also lacked modern potent firepower against maritime threats that the Indian aircraft carriers may have to deal with in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR).
The Indian Navy had chosen Rafale Marine over the Boeing F/A-18 Super Hornet as its deck-based aircraft for the carriers INS Vikrant and INS Vikramaditya in 2022. When Modi visited France in March 2025, there was speculation that the Rafale Marine deal would be signed. But it took more than a month after Modi’s visit to Paris for the contract to be signed.
The Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS), India’s highest national defence and security decision-making body headed by Modi, on Apr. 9, 2025, approved the Rafale Marine contract to be signed as an IGA.
Future Indian aircraft carriers may use the indigenous Twin-Engine Deck-Based Fighter (TEDBF) currently in development. The Indian Navy had previously projected a requirement for 145 TEDBFs for three aircraft carriers. The Indian government intervened and suggested the navy project its requirements for just two aircraft carriers. This resulted in the Indian Navy paring down the numbers to 87 TEDBFs.
The Light Combat Aircraft-Navy project may not fructify into an operational deck-based naval fighter, as the engine thrust requirements were inadequate and are being worked on. The LCA-Navy project gets its funding from the Indian Navy budget. The TEDBF and LCA-Navy are being developed by the Defence Research and Development Organisation‘s Aeronautical Development Agency (ADA).
The Indian Navy suggested 14 essential upgrades for the TEDBF, including technological gaps such as automatic landing and take-off that the LCA-Navy had. Four of these technologies were tested on the LCA-Navy successfully in recent months, and the Indian Navy has accepted these upgrades, according to officials.
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