No more results for pilot tests

In a bid to prevent pilots from forging marksheets to get licenses, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has come out with a bright idea. The country's civil aviation regulator will not issue marksheets anymore, so that there are no papers to forge.

In a bid to prevent pilots from forging marksheets to get licenses, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has come out with a bright idea.

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The country's civil aviation regulator will not issue marksheets anymore, so that there are no papers to forge.

Three pilots were arrested by the Crime Branch of Delhi Police this month for forging marksheets to obtain a licence. The pilots furnished fake marksheets for their Airline Transport Pilot Licence (ATPL), which enables them to fly.

One of the accused pilots, Parminder Kaur Gulati, who was working for Indigo airlines, had allegedly forged the result card of the Pilot License Examination as proof of passing the Air Navigation and Radio Aids and Instruments subjects.

DGCA has also decided to take strict action against those trying to cheat in examinations by debarring them temporarily or permanently from reappearing for a test.

Examinations are conducted throughout the year by DGCA for pilots and their result cards have to be submitted for obtaining a licence.

The results are posted on the DGCA website and the qualifying candidates are issued with result cards by the Central Examination Organisation.

DGCA has now decided that candidates will not be given result cards and the Directorate of Licensing, which issues licenses, will check the result from central database of DGCA.

The candidates can, however, download the result page from DGCA website and enclose it with their application for the issue of license.

Strangely, both the directorates issuing mark sheets and licenses are part of DGCA but the accused pilots were able to hoodwink them with forged documents.

"We will not issue mark sheets to candidates and the main master copy of the result will remain with us," said DGCA chief EK Bharat Bhushan.

"This will remove the misunderstanding between two divisions in DGCA," he said.

He said that the Directorate of Licensing would corroborate the marks obtained by a candidate by checking the main database, which will remove any chances of forgery.

The DGCA is also going to strictly monitor flying tests and examinations and candidates found adopting any unfair means could be debarred for a year or more. Recently, DGCA have debarred eight candidates from appearing in examinations.

The regulator is now verifying all licenses issued by it in recent years for any of forgery.