At last truth about the Pakistan Airline (PIA) dubious licenses is coming to light. Representatives of Pakistan Airline Pilots’ Association (PALPA) told the Sub Committee of Senate Standing Committee on Civil Aviation that licenses of pilots of PK 661, which crashed near Hawelian on way from Chittral to Islamabad, were not genuine. It was further revealed to the Sub Committee that in 2018 scrutiny of PIA pilots’ examination record maintained by the Civil Aviation Authority had exposed discrepancies between the result sheets generated by the software and the attendance sheets of the candidates on the days of examinations. The Committee asked for the forensic report in the matter.
The opposition had resorted to cutting political angles when Civil Aviation Minister Ghulam Sarwar Khan made a statement in the National assembly that licenses of 262 have been found fake. Former Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbassi, who had served Chairman PIA, insisted in an interview on a private TV Channel that pilots’ examinations are conducted by Civil Aviation Authority in absolute transparent manner. Showing resentment over the statement of Aviation Minister, former Prime Minister argued that it will bring a misnomer to the image of the country and National Airline.
The matter of pilots with ingenuine flying licenses posed a grave risk to human lives during air travel. The government had taken right decision to make the names of public of pilots holding fake licenses by uploading on the website of Civil Aviation Authority and informing flying clubs accordingly. The issue was not that simple and straight forward as Shahid Khaqan Abbassi had portrayed, because International Air Transport Association (IATA) had then taken a notice of it. It was on the recommendation of (IATA) that the United States and European Union countries had banned PIA flights in their skies during the tenure of last PML-N government. The main reason cited was the large number of faulty and outmoded aircrafts in the fleet of the National Air Line. The irregularity of inducting pilots of counterfeit licenses is unlawful and can be used as pretext for banning the flight of national airline and other Pakistani airlines on international routes.
PIA was kept in the dilapidated state by the previous government to pave the way for its privitisation at throw away price, for which air traffic was declared as core function, loans, worn out airplanes and other liabilities as non-core function of the airline. The air traffic was selected for privitisation. Abandoning the induction of new aircraft in the fleet of PIA, appointments on political basis and adoption of open skies policy resulted in huge losses of the national carrier in addition to overburdening it with loans of over Rs. 200 billion. Hopefully, the submission of forensic report, rightsizing measures being taken for purging the political appointees and induction of brand new airplanes will help clear the accumulated mess in PIA.
https://thefrontierpost.com/pilots-fake-licenses/
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