LAHORE: Pakistan’s national carrier has terminated the contracts of over 50 employees, including seven pilots, after they were found guilty of holding fake degrees.
The directives were issued in view of the proceedings of Pakistan’s Supreme Court against pilots and cabin crews with fake degrees and certificates.
“Action has been taken against the PIA employees after the respective educational institutions found their degrees bogus/fake,” a statement issued by the Pakistan’s Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) said.
Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) spokesperson Mashood Tajwar said that a probe has been initiated into the cases of all staffers who were hired holding sham degrees.
The CAA said that degree verification of another 400 PIA employees is underway. Director General of CAA Hassan Baig has also issued directives to suspend the licenses of all those pilots and cabin crews who have not yet submitted their degrees and certificates.”
Their licenses will remain suspended till they submit their referred documents for verification,” Baig said.
The CAA had revealed before a Supreme Court bench this week that academic credentials of seven pilots of the PIA had been found to be bogus.
The bench was hearing a matter relating to the verification of degrees of pilots and other staff of the PIA.
Five pilots of Pakistan’s flag carrier PIA have not even completed their matriculation, the country’s aviation body told the Supreme Court after finding the academic credentials of seven pilots bogus.
Justice Ijazul Ahsan said a non-matric person could not even drive a bus but these people were flying planes, putting the lives of passengers in danger, Dawn news reported.
Academic credentials of seven PIA pilots were found to be bogus and five of them had not even done matric, the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) revealed before the Supreme Court (SC) bench, headed by Chief Justice Saqib Nisar, on Friday, the report said.
The bench was hearing a matter relating to the verification of degrees of pilots and other staff of the PIA. The CAA complained that educational boards and universities were not cooperating with it in carrying out the degree verification process. It said that cases of 4,321 employees of the PIA had been verified while 402 were pending, the report said. Justice Nisar asked the PIA to submit a list of its all 498 pilots along with their result of licence examination, the report added. Last month, the cash-strapped Pakistani government approved a Rs 1,700 crore bailout package for its ailing national flag carrier PIA which has been running into losses for years. The government approved the bailout package to keep it afloat. The PIA’s accumulated losses surged to Rs 36,000 crore by the end of June, which, according to the finance ministry, speaks volumes about the persistently deteriorating performance of the carrier. The PIA has been in losses for years but successive governments have failed to improve its financial situation. (PTI)
