EVEN as controversy over Rafale deal rages on, the first cockpit section of Falcon 2000 service jet, produced by Dassault Reliance Aerospace Limited (DARL) at its MIHAN manufacturing facility here, was handed over to Dassault Aviation on Friday, according to a statement from Multimodal International Hub Airport at Nagpur (MIHAN).
Tina Ambani, chairperson, Group CSR, Reliance Group, who was present on the occasion, said, according to the statement, “We want to put deadline ahead of headlines.”
The company stated, “The first cockpit front section of Falcon 2000 series produced by DRAL in its manufacturing facility at MIHAN, Nagpur, has been handed over to Dassault Aviation’s Falcon final assembly line of France in an in-house ceremony at MIHAN SEZ facility of DRAL.”
“By early 2022, we want to assemble the complete Falcon 2000 aircraft here in Nagpur and want to fly it out from here,” DRAL’s CEO Sampathkumaran S T said.
The plant will be capable of producing two aircraft per month once fully operational, the company stated.
Suresh Kakani, managing director of Maharashtra Airport Development Company, the nodal agency for MIHAN project, told The Indian Express, “We provided DRAL with all basic supporting infrastructure such as power, water and construction permit by April 2018. They raised the building in two months and manufactured the first cockpit within a record eight months. This was about a month ahead of the March 2019 deadline.”
