Macron says he wasn't in charge when Rafael deal was made; defers to Modi
United Nations, Sep 26 : French President Emmanuel Macron has said that he was not in charge when the Rafael deal was made and that he would defer to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the matter which he said was "very importanta to him.
"I was not in charge at that time but I know that we have very clear rules and this is a government-to-government discussion," he said at a news conference here on Tuesday.
"I just want to refer to what Prime Minister Modi very clearly has said a few days ago and I (don't) have any other comment," he said.
He was replying to a question if France had been asked to use the Reliance group as the Indian partner for the Rafael deal made when Francois Hollande was the President.
As a part of the offset component of the deal to buy 36 Rafael costing about 7.87 billion Euros (or Rs 58,000 crore), the manufacturer Dassault was required to outsource to India about Rs 30,000 crore of business.
The Congress and the opposition have accused the government of inflating the cost of the jets and steering the business to a private company,
"This contract is part of a broader framework which is a military and defence relationship between India and France. And this one is very important to me because this is a strategic coalition and not just an industrial relation," he added.
"I would be very clear that it was a government-to-government discussion," he emphasised.
Macron took office last year in May while Modi announced the deal during a visit to France in 2015 and it was finalised the following year.
The controversy began when Hollande told a French publication that India had proposed Reliance Defence as the partner for the deal.
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Mathura boat capsize tragedy: Death toll climbs to 13
Mathura (UP)(PTI): With the recovery of two more bodies on Sunday, the death toll in the boat capsize incident in the Yamuna river in Mathura has climbed to 13, officials said on Sunday.
Search for three more missing persons is underway.
Superintendent of Police (Rural) Suresh Chandra Rawat said renewed search efforts led to the recovery of the body of a college student, identified as Dinki Bansal, near Devraha Baba Ghat and that of a man identified as Rishabh Sharma approximately 3 km away from the accident site.
The incident occurred on Friday afternoon when a boat carrying over two dozen tourists, primarily from Punjab, hit a floating drum of a pontoon bridge and capsized near Kesi Ghat in Vrindavan.
Most of the victims were from Jagraon and Dugri areas of Ludhiana district.
Teams from the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) and State Disaster Response Force (SDRF) along with the district administration and local police were actively engaged in the search for the missing pilgrims.
However, strong currents of the Yamuna river and the significant depth of the water at the ghats are proving a hindrance.
Circle Officer (Mant) Sandeep Singh said the Yamuna river stretch extending from Keshi Ghat to Gokul Barrage has been divided into seven sectors.
The search for the missing individuals will now be conducted within this specific 20-square-km zone. A Station House Officer (SHO) has been designated as the in-charge for each sector.
Acting on the orders of the DIG (Agra Range), seven SHOs will oversee operations across the seven sectors of river Yamuna.
Giving details about the operation, Additional District Magistrate (Finance and Revenue) Pankaj Kumar Verma, citing NDRF officials, on Saturday had said although the search for the missing persons is currently focused within a 14-km radius from the spot where the boat had capsized, there is a possibility that they may have been swept much further downstream.
SHO of Vrindavan police station Sanjay Pandey said boat operator Pappu was arrested late on Friday night.
He is accused of failing to provide life jackets to passengers before allowing them to board the boat, and operating the boat at high speed. This resulted in the boat losing control and colliding with a pontoon bridge's drum, which led to the accident, officials said.
Police have registered a case and also arrested the contractor, Narayan Sharma, responsible for the repair work on the pontoon bridge.
Rawat said that on Friday evening, police registered a case under section 105 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) against the boatman Pappu (alias Dauji) and Sharma, and subsequently arrested them.
According to the case details, Pappu's boat did not have any safety equipment or provisions whatsoever.
Moreover, despite repeated pleas from pilgrims, Pappu operated the boat at high speed. By the time he realised the danger upon approaching the pontoons of the bridge, it was already too late.
Consequently, after colliding with a pontoon drum, the boat lost control and capsized. It has also come to light that he is among those operators who have not obtained the requisite license to operate a boat.
Sharma was carrying out the work of dismantling and reassembling the pontoon bridge without providing any prior notification.
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