Air India and the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) today questioned the maintainability of a plea against the appointment of a senior pilot of the airline to its Board in the Delhi High Court.
The airline told Justice Sanjeev Sachdeva the plea moved by an association of pilots of the national carrier was in the nature of a PIL and cannot be heard by the court.
A similar argument was made by the DGCA and the senior pilot, Captain Arvind Kathpalia, whose appointment to the Board of Air India has been challenged by the Indian Commercial Pilots Association (ICPA).
Kathpalia is currently suspended from flying for three months till May 7 for not taking a breathalyser test before piloting a flight to Bengaluru in January this year.
After hearing brief arguments by the lawyers for AI, DGCA, the pilot and ICPA, the court reserved its judgement in the matter.
ICPA, in its plea, has contended that the senior pilot had flown a flight to Bengaluru from Delhi without taking the mandatory breathalyser test and then operated the return flight too without taking the test.
Thereafter, he had proceeded to "forge" the pre-flight medical register in Delhi after arriving back here, the ICPA had alleged.
In his reply to the allegations, Kathpalia has contended that he did not take the test to avoid delaying the flight.
His lawyers also vehemently denied any "malafide intent" on the pilot's part regarding the entry made in the pre-flight register by him and claimed it was an "error of judgement".
The promotion of Kathpalia as Director (Operations) in the Air India Board was approved by the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC) after the DGCA suspended him from flying for three months.
The petitioners have alleged that the action as provided under the Civil Aviation Requirement was not taken in the instant case, as is done in other similar situations.
The DGCA, however, has denied the allegation saying that a three month suspension is provided for missing a pre-flight breathalyser test and the punishment is imposed in all such cases.
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