M A I N   N E W S

Indicted official made A-I safety chief
T.R. Ramachandran
Tribune News Service

New Delhi, August 31
In spite of a high-power internal committee holding former Director of Operations of Air India Capt M.K. Hathi guilty of ad-hocism in appointments and giving a go by to the overarching DGCA’s Civil Aviation Rules (CAR), the carrier’s CMD V. Thulasidas has appointed him Executive Director, Air Safety.

The office order of August 16, taking immediate effect, also enjoins Captain Hathi to oversee training requirements to ensure safety standards, coordinating activities involved with quality management system for maintaining the IOSA rating, holding wage negotiations with trained personnel like pilots, flight dispatchers, instructional personnel and Operations Department and any other functions that may be assigned by the CMD.

The bringing back of a person, who had been moved out as Director Operations, through the back door has raised many an eyebrow in Air India and aviation circles.

All this, after the CMD instituted a three-member inquiry committee headed by the then Director (Engineering), V.K. Mehra, who has since retired, to probe the charges of senior executive pilots that Captain Hathi was allegedly indulging in ad-hocism and blatant violation of the CAR and guidelines mandated by the DGCA, thus posing a serious threat to the travelling public.

The committee found several aspects pertaining to organisational matters and personnel issues in respect of Capt M.K. Hathi to be true. The committee report said seniority and experience was thrown to the winds in the appointment of Capt Pushpinder Singh, Chief of Operations of Air India Express.

It found perplexing that Captain Hathi could not find “anybody in 50 commanders senior to Capt Pushpinder Singh. Similarly, the positions of Chief of Air Safety and Chief of Training have been filled by very junior commanders.”