Penalise those making pilots fly in adverse conditions: MPs

By IANS,

New Delhi : A parliamentary committee has asked the government to come up with penal provisions against those travellers, including VIPs, who force helicopter pilots to operate in hostile conditions.

"Some kind of penal provision may be considered against those putting pressure on the pilots to fly without proper clearances," said the Parliamentary Standing Committee on transport, tourism and culture report, tabled in parliament Thursday.

The committee headed by Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) member Sitaram Yechury also recommended that pilots and other technical personnel should be provided with legal and administrative rights to decline flight operations in the absence of technical clearance.

"The committee recommends that technical personnel, pilots be provided adequate legal, administrative protection to decline to fly in the absence of mandatory technical, weather and other clearances," the report said.

The report observed that undue pressure is put, including for commercial reasons, on technical personnel, including pilots, to ignore key safety related clearance to operate flights.

"It happens mainly in the cases of chartered helicopters and those under the state governments, flying VIPs," the report said.