DGCA made contract staff scapegoats by blaming them for IndiGo fiasco, alleges aviation expert
NEW DELHI: The removal of four Flight Operations Inspectors (FOIs) in the aftermath of the Indigo fiasco by the aviation regulator, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation, (DGCA) has run into controversy. An expert with 40 years of experience in the aviation industry, Sanjay Lazar, stirred a hornets nest on Sunday by charging the regulator of making scapegoats of the lower rung staff and demanded a probe by the Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) to identify those responsible for the turmoil caused by the airline. Meanwhile, the DGCA countered the charges by stating the officials removed were directly responsible for keeping a watch on the functioning of Indigo for quite some time and had failed to do so. An order issued on December 11 by Sunil Singh Rawat, Deputy Director of Administration, DGCA, stated, The following FOIs under various categories, on contract basis, in DGCA are hereby relieved from DGCA with immediate effect to join their respective parent organisations. They are pilots drawn from different airlines who were temporarily posted at the DGCA. The names specified were Rish Raj Chatterjee (Consultant working as Deputy Chief Operations Inspector), Seema Jhamnani (Senior FOI) as well as Anil Kumar Pokahriyal and Priyam Kaushik (both Consultant FOIs) . It was an important development as they were the first heads to roll following the anguish experienced by lakhs of Indigo flyers from December 1 to 9. Lazar, an advocate and the CEO of Avialaz Consultants, said he was initially happy to learn that action had been initiated against these officials. Later, he realised that they were actuallylow hanging fruit and billed them 'Bali ka Bakra. I got to know only this morning that one of them, Pokhariyal, had resigned a couple of months ago, he claimed. He has been diagnosed with cancer during and was hospitalised. Calling Captain Kaushik a hero, Lazar recalled a 2016 incident when a Jet Airways flight from Bengaluru to Mangaluru caught fire mid-air. With one engine on fire, he landed the aircraft safely and saved 65 lives. He also led the first Kaveri operations from Sudan to Chennai during the 2023 repatriation mission, he said. Lazar added that the Captain, who is the son of a Defence Officer, told him during his interaction that he was not even involved in this as he was an 'Alternate Inspector (deployed when regular inspector is not available). I have been here only 6 or 8 months. I have neither been assigned any work in Indigo nor have I been called up, Captain Kaushik told him, Lazar added. The expert also added that the Captains wife expressed her anguish over the fact that ever since his name was made public, her kids found it difficult to even step out. Regarding Captain Chatterjee, Lazar said that he served as the Deputy Chief Pilot of Vistara He has a spotless, blameless record and he flew the 787s. The Captain had actually flagged the lapses at IndiGo to the regulator in a mail and was the first to alert them that 1,200 flights had not operated in November, the expert said. Victimisation without any inquiry All these pilots were removed without any letter officially, any inquiry, any show cause notice, no investigation, just ex parte and arbitrary. That also smacks of victimisation without any proof, he charged. He alleged that two or three top people were responsible for the fiasco. They are Joint Director Generals and one is an AD (Assistant Director). We know everybodys names. He billed the investigations by DGCA as a big cover-up game. The same officials who are responsible for giving favours to IndiGo are on the panel to probe the airline. A senior DGCA official told this reporter, The four were indeed assigned by the DGCA to monitor the airline and ensure they complied with all regulations Elaborating on each of those suspended, the official said that Pokahriyal went on medical leave for his cancer treatment only by late November this year. He is an Alliance Air pilot and has not resigned from there. Kaushik, was an Air India Express pilot, who was monitor the DGCA since Feb 2025, well before the first phase of FDTL would come into effect. Chatterjee was with the DGCA since May 2024. He may have been a celebrity pilot but that does not absolve him of his duties, the official stressed. Jamnani was told to keep a tab on Indigo for over a year. When asked about the controversy, a senior official in the Ministry of Civil Aviation said he would look into it.
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