Rajnath, French defence minister to attend Rafale induction today
More than a month after the first five Rafale fighter jets arrived in India on July 29, they will be formally inducted as part of the 17 Squadron, nicknamed Golden Arrows, on Thursday. The ceremony at Ambala Air Force Station will be attended by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and French Minister of the Armed Forces Florence Parly.
These five jets are the first batch of the total 36 aircraft that India had bought off-the-shelf through an inter-governmental deal from France in September 2016 for Rs 59,000 crore. The next batch of the jets is likely to arrive in October, and the last of the 36 aircraft will come to India by end of 2021. Since the arrival of the five jets, the focus had been to operationalise the aircraft at the earliest.
