Nepal said Friday a test pilot employed by a French aviation giant had perpetrated a Himalayan fraud by claiming to have landed on Mount Everest.

Didier Delsalle, who was flying a Eurocopter, has now admitted to landing 1,000m lower than the 8,848m summit, a Nepalese official said Friday.

This would restore the earlier record held by the Indian Air Force. Flying an indigenously manufactured Cheetal helicopter last November, Group Captain A.S. Butola and Squadron Leader S. Sharma landed at Saserkangri in Ladakh at an altitude of 7,070m.

Even if Delsalle landed at 7,848m on Everest's South Col, technically it would seem invalid since he did not have permission to land for any purpose other than an emergency.

"Delsalle had taken permission only to test-fly his chopper at high altitude but not make any landing," Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal (CAAN) deputy director-general Keshav Raj Khanal said in a statement Friday.

"During his flight, the weather deteriorated and the strong winds forced him to turn back. He had to make a u-turn for which he briefly landed on South Col and then headed back.  Otheriwse, he would have been forced to stray into China's air space, for which he had no permission," Khanal added.

Delsalle claimed to have landed on the 8,848m Everest summit May 14 but this hit the headlines only May 25 after he returned to France. The truth emerged after two written interviews with Nepalese authorities when he admitted to landing 1,000m lower.

Dated May 19 and 20, Delsalle's statements say he had to make an emergency landing at the South Col but doesn't make any claims about creating a world record by landing on Mt Everest.

According to aviation authorities, Delsalle's chopper was followed by another with soldiers from the Royal Nepalese Army and they had witnessed him making an emergency landing at South Col. 

CAAN's statement seems to throw egg on Eurocopter's face and upholds the IAF record.

Eurocopter is a wholly owned subsidiary of EADS, the worldwide leader in aerospace, defence, and the associated services. The EADS group, that generated a turnover of 31.8 billion euros in 2004, and employed approximately 110,000 people throughout the world, includes aircraft maker Airbus, and the world's second largest missile company, the joint venture MDBA.

It is also the major industrial partner for Galileo, the European satellite-based navigation system.

A press release from Paris used the supposed high-altitude landing to extoll the Eurocopter's virtues.

It said: "After taking off from his base camp Lukla on May 14 at 2,866 m, Didier Delsalle onboard his Ecureuil AS350B3 reached the top of Mount Everest. As required by the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale (FAI - International Aeronautical Federation), the aircraft remained on ground more than two minutes on the top of the world before flying back to Lukla. This feat was renewed the day after.

"Stepping out of his helicopter, Didier Delsalle commented: 'To reach this mythical summit seemed to be a dream; despite the obvious difficulties of the target to be reached, the aircraft demonstrated its capability to cope with the situation."

Desperate mountaineers and record seekers are known to make false claims and falsify records.

This mountaineering season, there was an earlier controversy about a Korean climber who claimed to have scaled a peak while the mountaineers following him said he did not.