The Supreme Court on Monday declined to entertain a PIL by advocate M.L. Sharma seeking an independent probe into the Rafale fighter jet deal in view of a French media report, claiming Dassault Aviation paid one million Euros to a middleman for executing the deal.
A bench headed by Chief Justice U.U. Lalit and comprising Justice S. Ravindra Bhat told Sharma that the court was not inclined to entertain the plea. “No case is made out for interference of this court…,” said the bench.
In an attempt to persuade the court to entertain his plea, Sharma said that one day will come when each and every person will feel helpless and further added that nobody came forward to question corruption. The Chief Justice told Sharma that the court has already passed the order to dismiss the plea. Later, Sharma agreed to withdraw the plea, which was allowed by the court. Sharma said he will go to the CBI in the matter. The top court said, “Nobody is stopping you”.
The plea had sought prosecution of an alleged middleman under charges of cheating, breach of trust, and criminal conspiracy, over alleged kickbacks of one million Euros in the Rafale fighter jet deal.
Sharma relied on reports by Mediapart, a French online journal, published earlier this month. The online journal claimed that it was in possession of documents that showed Dassault Aviation, which manufactures the Rafale jet, and its industrial partner Thales, a defence electronics firm, paid around 1 million euros “secret commissions” in connection with the deal.