Ever since VVIPs of Pakistan have started travelling on state or self owned private jets, governments in power have shown their casual disregard to performance and flight safety of airlines regulated by state. This has lead to rise in accidents, callous disregard of passenger convenience and frequent imposition of partial bans by EU and others. CAA Pakistan has made public its report about investigation conducted by them about April 20, 2012 crash resulting in 127 fatalities, including crew of that ill-fated flight from Karachi to Islamabad. CAA and Federal Government must understand that travelling public of Pakistan, whose taxes fund CAA and whose interest this organization is required by law to safeguard, have to be satisfied by regulatory authority.
Without going into merits and demerits of investigation, or professional competence of those at helm in CAA, if we are to accept findings of this investigation at face value, questions arise what remedial action and punitive steps has authority taken against those within its fold responsible for licensing crew, granting AOC to Bhoja Air and issuing it a license which requires financial capacity and infrastructure to meet all eventualities such as accidents etc. Was it not legal and moral obligation of CAA to ensure that Bhoja Air had sufficient financial resources and insurance cover to compensate victims of air crash? What legal and procedural steps has CAA taken to ensure that Bhoja Air MD Arshad Jaleel is repatriated back to Pakistan to either face prosecution or ensure compensation for next of kin of those 127 innocent souls who perished.
CAA report states that pilot was not trained to handle advanced auto flight instruments installed on B737, forgetting the fact that CAA itself is responsible for licensing pilots, aircraft engineers etc and itself stands condemned by these lapses. CAA must also declare what steps it has taken to ensure that no Airline Operator licensed by it fails to meet their obligations to passengers in future and that it has capacity to perform its regulatory functions free from political or petty corporate interests of investors, by inbuilt self auditing to prevent any conflicts of interest.
MALIK TARIQ ALI
Lahore
