Rajasthan flying school to get wings again after 11 years

JAIPUR: Now, those aspiring to be pilots need not go out of the state for training. The Rajasthan State Flying School in Jaipur, one-of-its-kind in the state, is being revived to train aspiring pilots after a gap of about 11 years.
Chief minister Ashok Gehlot, who is also the president of the governing council of the flying school, has given his nod. Flying school has been in a limbo for over a decade after it was hit by various irregularities in issuing commercial pilot licence.
Kesari Singh, director, civil aviation said, “The chief minister has given his nod. We will shortly convene a governing council meeting to formally endorse the proposal.”
On being asked about the facilities available at the flying school, he said at present the flying school has two planes and a motor glider to train aspiring pilots. “We have a Cessna 172 four-seater plane and Cessna 152 two-seater plane. The school also plans two more planes soon.” He said according to the plan, a batch of 20 students has been decided upond initially.
The state government had earlier also made efforts to revive the school but did not succeed. Sources added that the state government will have to go for various licences before giving a nod to start the flying school.
The flying school hit headlines in 2008 when the anti-corruption bureau (ACB) exposed a scam when one of the trainees of the school, Nidhi Vashishtha, approached the bureau claiming that she was trained only for 22 hours but the chief flying officer Mahendra Chaudhary mentioned 169 hours of flying in the school record and sent it to DGCA.
During investigation, names of 14 pilots had come up who were issued flying certificates through dubious means by chief flying inspector of the school at the Sanganer airport. These certificates were used by the pilots to get commercial pilot licences (CPL) from DGCA. Similar arrests were made in Delhi and Haryana.