Fake pilots: Four more held
March 26th, 2011 - 9:49 pm ICT by IANSNew Delhi, March 26 (IANS) Four more people, including a directorate general of civil aviation (DGCA) official, have been arrested for their alleged involvement in the fake pilots scam, police said Saturday.
With these arrests, police have held six people so far in connection with procurement of pilots licences using forged marksheets.
Three other pilots are still on the run, while a fourth pilot has joined investigations.
“We have smashed this gang. We are looking for three pilots and a conduit of the racket, who is a flying instructor in Mumbai,” said Deputy Commissioner of Police Ashok Chand.
Pradeep Kumar, 48, an assistant director with the airline regulator DGCA, Pradeep Tyagi, 35, the pilot who helped others to procure fake marksheets, and his two associates Pankaj Jain, 23, and Lalit Jain, 34, were arrested between Wednesday and Friday from Delhi and Chennai.
Pankaj Jain and Pradeep Kumar were arrested from the capital Friday, while Lalit was arrested from Chennai Thursday. Tyagi was arrested from Rohini Wednesday.
Tyagi had arranged a forged result card through Lalit Jain and Pankaj Jain in east Delhi after paying them Rs.100,000. He also paid about Rs.25,000 to the DGCA official for ensuring that there was no hitch in processing the papers, police said.
During investigation, it was found that Tyagi had obtained commercial pilot licence through forged documents and fudged flying hours in June 2010. Since 2008, he developed contacts in DGCA for smooth processing of the papers and for grant of licences to the pilots who had engaged him for this purpose.
Tyagi had helped Parminder Kaur Gulati, Meenakshi Sehgal, J.K. Verma, Swaran Singh Talwar, Syed Habib Ali and Bhupender Singh in obtaining licences on the basis of forged documents.
“Pradeep Tyagi used to charge Rs.600,000, of which he used to pay Rs.100,000 to Lalit Jain and Pankaj Jain for preparing forged result card, and Rs.20,000 to 25,000 to Pradeep Kumar,” said Chand.
The first to be apprehended was suspended IndiGo pilot Parminder Kaur Gulati March 8 and J.K. Verma of Air India four days later.
Meenakshi Sehgal of IndiGo, another suspect, has obtained a court order preventing her arrest, though she has been asked to join investigations.
However, pilots Swaran Singh Talwar of MDLR and Syed Habib Ali and Bhupinder Singh, who have licences but have not joined any airline, are still on the run.
- Lookout notices issued for three fake pilots, instructor - Mar 28, 2011
- One more fake pilot arrested (Lead) - Apr 04, 2011
- Two more held in fake pilot scam - Apr 05, 2011
- Fake pilot scam: Two DGCA staffers held for forgery (Lead) - Apr 06, 2011
- Aviation regulator to screen 4,000 pilots for fake licences - Mar 14, 2011
- One more held in fake pilots' licence scam (Second Lead) - Apr 20, 2011
- Fake pilot licence issue may be limited to few: official - Mar 14, 2011
- Expert committee to look into pilot licence procedures - Mar 15, 2011
- Three more pilots under scanner for fake licence - Apr 12, 2011
- Two more fake pilots on the run, licences being probed (Roundup) - Mar 14, 2011
- Operations safe, asserts Air India; another pilot grounded - Mar 16, 2011
- Fake pilot scam: Govt. directs DGCA to probe all pilot licenses - Mar 15, 2011
- Fake pilot scam: Delhi Police issues lookout notice against four persons - Mar 28, 2011
- Fake pilots: Aviation regulator screens 3,000 licences - Mar 13, 2011
- Fake pilot probe: Two DGCA officials held - Apr 06, 2011
Tags: airline regulator, chand, civil aviation, commercial pilot licence, commissioner of police, deputy commissioner, dgca, directorate general, east delhi, flying instructor, gulati, habib ali, jain, lalit, pradeep kumar, result card, sehgal, swaran singh, talwar, three pilots