Chandigarh: The hoary French adage, “Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose” – the more things change, the more they remain the same – could well have been coined for the Indian Air Force’s (IAF’s) perpetually circular combat aircraft procurement process.Barely a decade after abandoning the original deal for 126 twin-engine Dassault Rafale fighters under the Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) tender, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) is believed to have finalised a Letter of Request (LoR) to France for the acquisition of 114 of the same aircraft type for the IAF. This, in effect, is tantamount to reviving the fighter procurement that was earlier shelved without a clear explanation and is now reintroduced under the rebranded Multi-Role Fighter Aircraft (MRFA) programme launched in 2017-18. According to a report published in The Indian Express on Monday (May 25), this LoR is likely to be dispatched “very soon” to Paris as part of an Inter-Governmental Agreement (IGA) through which the 114 Rafale fighter deal would eventually be processed.In accordance with the MRFA project, 90 of these 114 Rafales are to be series-built in India through a collaborative venture between Dassault Aviation and a yet-to-be-identified domestic Strategic Partner (SP), while the remaining 24 are to be acquired in flyaway condition. The MoD’s Defence Acquisition Council (DAC) had earlier approved this MRFA proposal in February, formally setting the Rafale acquisition in motion via the government-to-government (G2G) IGA mechanism.Once France responds to the LoR, the MoD is expected to issue a Request for Proposal (RFP) or formal tender for the 114 fighters, paving the way for commercial negotiations and subsequent approval by the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS), headed by the prime minister. The entire fighter acquisition process is expected to culminate in a contract by year-end, IE report optimistically noted, a timeline with which industry officials strongly disagreed.The irony of the proposed deal, however, lies not merely in the return of the same F3R fighter type to the procurement cycle but in the stark inversion of cost, scale, and ambition that now defines the entire MRFA project as compared to the earlier 2007-08 MMRCA tender.For what was earlier envisaged as a $10–12 billion MMRCA programme for 126 Rafales, with extensive industrial participation and technology transfer to Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) for local manufacture of 108 aircraft, has effectively been reconfigured in scope and structure.Also read: Back-to-Back RAF F-35B Groundings Raise Questions About Reliability of NATO’s Top FighterEight years after being scrapped by the Bharatiya Janata Party-led (BJP-led) Union government in 2016, it has re-emerged as a $40 billion acquisition for 114 aircraft, rendering it roughly four times the cost of the original plan, despite involving fewer fighters and a far less defined industrial framework. This excludes additional costs such as weapons packages, infrastructure, and training support, industry officials said.This escalation was further compounded by a series of interim decisions taken between the abandonment of the MMRCA tender under the Congress Party-led federal coalition and the current 114-aircraft MRFA proposal under the BJP-led administration. In this intervening phase, the newly elected BJP government had concluded a truncated emergency purchase of 36 Rafales in September 2016 for Rs 58,000 crore (about $8.8 billion at the time), describing it as an “urgent capability infusion”.Consequently, the sequence of decisions in the Rafale procurement process has drawn sharp criticism from within the IAF veteran community itself, with a two-star fighter pilot ruefully pointing out that the MoD had effectively returned to the same runway from which it had earlier taxied away. “What is now being framed as a reset in the Rafale acquisition process,” he added on condition of anonymity, “has in effect looped back to its starting point – only more expensive, far more delayed, and potentially far more structurally constrained than before.”Equally significant in the proposed 114 Dassault Rafale acquisition is the lack of clarity around the MoD’s still nebulous SP model for indigenous defence manufacturing, including its application to the upcoming Rafale deal. There is little clarity on how the framework will be operationalised in practice, particularly in terms of workshare, production responsibilities, and technology integration. This opacity has contributed to widespread uncertainty over the industrial structure of the programme, with even basic parameters of execution remaining undefined at this stage.Under the SP model, the private and public sector contenders are drawn from a small pool of large industrial groups with proven defence manufacturing depth, systems integration experience, and the financial capacity to absorb long-gestation programmes like the Rafale. Aeronautics industry officials said the final selection will therefore hinge not just on manufacturing capability, but on the ability to integrate complex supply chains and sustain long-term aircraft production at scale under stringent aerospace certification standards.The frontrunner by capability and track record is Tata Advanced Systems Limited, which already operates extensive aerospace manufacturing lines- including the Airbus Defence and Space C-295 transporter, which produces aerostructures, works with multiple global original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and has demonstrated the ability to execute complex aviation programmes at scale. Close behind is Larsen & Toubro, a highly regarded defence industrial integrator with major experience in submarines, missiles, launch systems, radars, and precision fabrication – even if its direct fixed-wing aircraft exposure is more limited. Adani Defence & Aerospace, for its part, has recently signed a cooperation agreement with Brazil’s Embraer, strengthening its aerospace credentials and expanding its footprint into fixed-wing aircraft sectors beyond helicopters and drones. This partnership is part of Adani’s strategy to move up the value chain in aerospace systems and leverage Embraer’s design, manufacturing, and certification expertise – potentially positioning the group as a credible contender under the SP model for combat aircraft production like Rafale fighters. Mahindra Defence Systems remains a plausible, but second-tier candidate, with experience in aerostructures and defence platforms. Bharat Forge, on the other hand, given its strengths in precision engineering and artillery systems, is more likely to emerge as a major tier supplier than a prime integrator, while Reliance Defence – selected as the principal Indian offset partner by Dassault Aviation for the earlier 36-Rafale buy- now reportedly faces financial problems, thereby reducing its standing relative to rival SP contenders. Also read: The Indian Army Just Slashed a Colonel’s Pension In Half. Other Veterans Got the MessageMeanwhile, another key challenge in the MRFA project concerns the selection of the SP, specifically whether it will be chosen by the MoD-IAF combine or by Dassault Aviation. This choice is far from procedural, as each option carries distinct hazards.If the government makes the selection, it risks being seen as politically motivated; if Dassault is allowed to shortlist, it raises concerns over transparency and alignment with national industrial policy. Each route, therefore, invites dispute – one over discretion, the other over sovereignty and until this question is resolved, the industrial structure of the Rafale deal will remain uncertain. In a project of this financial and operational scale, ambiguity over SP selection is not just a detail, but a major fault line.Equally unresolved is the question of whether HAL will once again figure in the MRFA programme, considering its long experience in aircraft manufacture. Official sources said that this uncertainty too remains central to the broader industrial structure of the Rafale project and could yet reopen many of the same production, liability, and workshare issues that complicated the earlier MMRCA negotiations. Taken together, the proposed 114-aircraft Dassault Rafale acquisition reflects less a coherent long-term strategy by the IAF and MoD than a procurement cycle marked by delay, reversals, weakened bargaining leverage, and steadily escalating expenditure. Far from demonstrating institutional clarity, the programme appears to have circled back to an earlier solution after years of drift and indecision.Furthermore, while indigenous content in these locally built Rafales is expected to be around 50 per cent, India is unlikely to receive full access to the fighters’ source code – the underlying proprietary software that governs the aircraft’s mission systems, avionics, sensors, and core operational functions. Dassault has historically resisted sharing such core software with customers, citing intellectual property rights, export control restrictions, and the risk of compromising a tightly integrated combat system architecture.Instead, industry sources indicated that the MoD and IAF plan on seeking access to the Rafales Interface Control Documents (ICDs) – technical integration blueprints that define how onboard systems communicate with external weapons, sensors, and equipment – thereby enabling the integration of indigenous munitions like the Astra air-to-air missile and the BrahMos-NG onto the French fighter. In retrospect, had the MMRCA programme been allowed to proceed as envisaged, the IAF would almost certainly have been operating a far larger Rafale fleet today, with well over 100 aircraft inducted – many of them built in India under licensed production – alongside a mature production ecosystem and deeper industrial absorption.But that discontinuity, mired in political rivalry and strategic short-sightedness, endures in the IAF’s depleted fighter force levels- down from a sanctioned 42 fighter squadrons to merely 29 presently- and overall force projection capability. At the same time, by ditching the MMRCA project, India effectively lost the opportunity to build a sustained fourth-generation fighter production ecosystem around a proven aerial combat platform, along with associated industrial learning curves across both public and private sectors. Moreover, such a foundation, once established, could also have been leveraged for subsequent indigenous programmes, including 5th-generation fighter development efforts like the proposed Advanced Medium Combat Aircraft (AMCA) project. In hindsight, senior IAF and MoD veterans associated with the MMRCA project have argued that it represented more than a procurement decision; it was a structural opportunity which, if then executed, would likely have left the IAF significantly stronger today – numerically, industrially, and operationally – than its present position suggests. The MRFA, for its part, despite its new label and timing, carries much the same DNA as the MMRCA programme – appearing less like a fresh start and more like a delayed return to the same short-sighted logic, leaving the entire process confused and directionless, where the more things change, the more they remain the same.