India’s negotiating team for 36 Rafale fighter jets “held 74 meetings to discuss the Rafale deal between May, 2015 and April, 2016,” the government told the Supreme Court in 2018. Twenty-six of these meetings were with the French side. According to Swarajya, the French side quoted 8.6 billion euros in January 2016. The contract signed on September 23, 2016, was for 7.878 billion euros.
The size of the saving is disputed. The Comptroller and Auditor General found the deal 2.86 percent cheaper than the one negotiated under the earlier UPA government. Three experts on the negotiating team dissented. In their view, the price had not been shown to be reasonable.