India and France will hold a joint air combat exercise next month, where six Indian Sukhoi- 30MKI fighters, two IL-76 heavy-lift aircraft and a IL-78 mid-air refueler will take part, local media reported Tuesday.

"The exercise will help to further enhance interoperability between the Indian and French air forces since pilots as well as the ground crew will get to see each other's operational, technical and administrative practices from close quarters," local daily The Times of India quoted an Indian Air Force official as saying.

The exercise, Garuda-IV, will be held at the Istres airbase in France from June 14 to 25. It comes at a time when India and France are all set now to ink the around 100 billion rupee (2 billion U.S. dollars) deal to upgrade the 56 Mirage-2000 fighter jets in IAF's combat fleet.

The first four to six Mirages will be upgraded in France, with the rest 50 being upgraded in India under transfer of technology.

India's defense ties with France are quite broad-based, including as they do the over 200 billion rupee (4 billion U.S. dollars) project to build six French Scorpene submarines currently underway at Mazagon Docks.

France has also offered its multi-role Rafale fighter for the ongoing competition in the 10.4 billion U.S. dollar project to supply 126 medium multi-role combat aircraft to IAF, the report said.

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