KARACHI: Ambreen Aslam Judge of Special Court (Central-II), Karachi discharged two cases of 35 PIA pilots by cancelling their bail bonds and sureties discharged.

Case No. 20 of 2022 and No. 23 of 2022 were registered through FIR No. 07/2021 and FIR No. 23/2021 U/s 409,420, 468, 471/162, 109, 34 PPC R/W Sec.5(2) PCA-1947 by FIA CCC Karachi. 

Court order said, keeping in view fact that complainant had not specified names of pilots and there is no document annexed with complaint which could segregate case of 180 pilots with others who have not been charged by prosecution as total 267 pilots took the examination amongst them 180 pilots had not been sent up for charge and trial and only 67 pilots had been charged since allegation was against all concerned was same then question arises why Civil Aviation Authority and Federal Investigation Agency dealing them differently as some of them have been challaned and even during pendency of this case CAA renewed license of one pilot, so basically it seems that CAA and FIA have different approaches and different preferences for alleged accused persons.

FIA could not convince sub-committee that there was any conclusive proof against pilots to prove their guilt in criminal cases and committee found that registration of criminal cases against pilots should be terminated. Cases were regarding serious allegations leveled by ex-Minister Ghulam Sarwar Khan three years back against issuance of 262 pilot licenses. It was taken up by Senate Standing Committee in which irregularities were pointed out in pilot license examination record of 262 pilots, later on FIA and CAA cleared 180 pilots and registered cases against only 67 pilots. Forensic was not found satisfactory by Senate. Neither CAA nor FIA could explain before Senate how said report be used against one set of pilots while same report has been treated to be false against 180 pilots.

According to order prosecutor FIA and I.O. have not controverted Senate report and submitted that case may be disposed of accordingly. SI/I.O. Rahat Khan was present and contended that previous I.O. namely Rao Amir Umaid Butt and he attended Senate Committee proceedings along with Additional Director of FIA Headquarter, Islamabad.    

It was suggested and recommended regarding criminal case that pilots may be dealt in accordance with departmental law and departmental proceedings and criminal cases may be registered against employees who were allegedly involved in violating or deviating from rules and procedure.  Complaint forwarded by CAA and FIA for registration of case did not show any particular name of pilot. Senate report had questioned how and why some of pilots were nominated in FIRs while others with similar cases were not.

Published in The Daily National Courier, October, 09 2023

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