Air safety: India on a par with Uganda?

MUMBAI: India faces the threat of being downgraded by the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) for consistently not adhering to the safety standards of the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO). The result of the downgrade will mean that airlines like Jet Airways and Air India, which operate to and from the US, will face stringent security checks when planes land there.

������ The Director General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) is lobbying hard with the FAA to buy six months��� time to fall in line with the ICAO norms and prevent India from being downgraded from Category 1 to Category 2,������ said a source, adding that the FAA team was in Delhi last week as part of its international aviation safety assessment programme.

Category 2 nations are those that violate ICAO norms. As a Category 2 nation, India will join the ranks of Serbia, the Ukraine, Indonesia, Guyana and the like. Pakistan and China are in Category 1.

If downgraded, Air India and Jet will not be able to change or expand their US schedules. Also, other airlines will be unable to start operations there. If there are violations in the case of any Air India or Jet plane, the aircraft can be impounded and a heavy fine levied.

Captain A Ranganathan, an air safety consultant, said, ������ It���s not surprising that the FAA wants to downgrade India . For the last four years, we have not been conforming to ICAO standards and the DGCA has not been functioning as a regulator. For instance, Indian carriers have done three wrong runway landings in the past one-and-a-half years. This could have been prevented had the DGCA carried out proper safety audits.������

DGCA Nazim Zaidi, who took over recently from Kanu Gohain, was unavailable for comment despite several attempts to contact him.In 2006, the ICAO itself had conducted a safety audit of India and found several violations.