wait. wut?: Fake pilots give India flying jitters

[xchrom]

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/MD14Df02.html

MUMBAI - A domestic flight from Delhi readies for take-off, the air hostess flaps her hands about with the safety instructions, and a passenger interrupts: "What do we do if the pilot here has a fake license?"

It's a question haunting the hundreds of thousands flying India's 11 domestic airlines each day. An erupting scandal is seeing almost a pilot a day being caught with a flying license gained by fudging their mark sheets and flying hours.

The reeling regulator, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), has so far caught 26 fake pilots, including commanders


and co-pilots. The crime branch police in Delhi and other cities have arrested the imposters, but some have absconded; others have filed for anticipatory bail.

India's corruption woes have now literally having hit sky high. But this airborne scam is only tip of the cloud. The DGCA has so far only checked a fraction of over 8,000 commercial pilot licenses under scrutiny. There are 1,704 Indian commanders and 6,331 co-pilots registered with the DGCA, the sole commercial flying license issuing authority in the country.

[marmar]

1. Yikes !!!

:scared:

[xchrom]

2. ditto

:scared: my paranoid other thought was -- where else is this happening?