New Delhi:
A day before Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to France, French defence major Naval Group announced to withdraw its participation in the P-75 India (P-75I) project as it cannot fulfil demands of Request for Proposal (RFP).
Laurent Videau, Country and Managing Director, Naval Group India, on Tuesday said, “Due to certain conditions in the RFP, the two strategic partners could not forward the request to us and few other FOEMs (foreign original equipment manufacturers) and thus we have not been able to place an official bid for the project,” reported news agency PTI.
“However, the present RFP requires that the fuel cell AIP (air independent propulsion) be sea proven, which is not the case for us yet since the French Navy does not use such propulsion system,” he mentioned.
Air independent propulsion (AIP) system helps a conventional submarine to stay submerged in water at higher speeds for a longer period of time.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is scheduled to visit Paris tomorrow (on May 4) where he will meet French President Emmanuel Macron who has been recently re-elected to his position.
Under P-75I project, a total number of six conventional submarines are supposed to be in India for the Indian Navy. The project worth Rs 43,000-crore.
The P-75I project is the second project to build submarines in India.
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