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Representatives from airlines, Airports Authority of India & CISF may be asked to depose before the panel, apart from companies running helicopter services in religious locations
The Air India flight plummeted to the ground minutes after departing from Ahmedabad’s Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International Airport on June 12. (Image Credit: PTI)
Members of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Transport, Tourism and Culture are likely to raise broader concerns surrounding air safety in light of the Ahmedabad flight crash and the helicopter crash in Uttarakhand’s Kedarnath.
Several members have already urged committee chairperson Sanjay Jha to prioritise the issue. It is learnt that the Jha-led panel will formally decide to take up this matter of urgent public concern and seek that the Ministry of Civil Aviation officials, BCAS and the DGCA appear before it.
The committee is aware of the ongoing investigation in the Air India crash case and therefore, would not think it wise to single out this case, the sources said.
Representatives from various airlines, Airports Authority of India (AAI), and CISF are expected to be asked to depose before the panel. The companies running helicopter services in various religious locations like Mata Vaishnav Devi and Kedarnath are also expected to be present before the committee.
“The recent crash has been very disturbing and with all kind of theories floating, we want to understand what the SOP really is in such cases and what are technicalities and technical challenges, role of the pilot etc,” a source said.
The committee also has BJP MP Rajiv Pratap Rudy as its member. Rudy has been the former civil aviation minister in the Vajpayee government and is also a commercial pilot.
Even after the Ahmedabad crash, a series of technical snags was reported onboard the Boeing Dreamliner aircraft over the last 48 hours, leading to several questions about the safety of passengers.
Meanwhile, after the Kedarnath crash on Sunday, operations of Aryan Aviation for the Char Dham Yatra were suspended with immediate effect. Two helicopters belonging to M/s TransBharat Aviation—VT-TBC (PIC: Capt. Yogesh Grewal, CPL(H)-1453) and VT-TBF (PIC: Capt. Jitender Harjai, CPL(H)-1046)—were found to have been airborne under similar unsuitable weather conditions. Accordingly, the licenses of both pilots have been suspended for six months.
A high-level enquiry has also been ordered both in the case of the Ahmedabad crash and the Uttarakhand crash. Apart from this, the Centre also set up a high-level committee led by the home secretary on cases like the Ahmedabad crash.
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