Aviation Minister Aims for 90% Recruitment at DGCA to Enhance Safety Standards, ETInfra
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NEW DELHI: The Ministry of Civil Aviation is aiming to soon undertake recruitment for 90 per cent of vacancies at India's civil aviation safety regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) in order to ensure a robust aviation safety regulatory regime in the country, said Kinjarapu Rammohan Naidu at the floor of the Parliament on Monday.According to the Ministry of Civil Aviation, the number of sanctioned positions in DGCA as on date are 1,644, out of which 823 posts are vacant.'Last year itself, we recruited (for) 103 posts, which in the history of DGCA was the highest number of posts which were recruited. By the end of October, we are going to recruit 190 posts for DGCA.' said Naidu.'Very soon we are in the process of achieving (recruitment) for 90 per cent of these vacancies,' he added.Naidu highlighted that in the last 10 years, the aviation industry has seen significant growth and the government has not been able to keep up with the recruitment needs as aircraft safety inspection and regulation is a niche area and there are a limited number of qualified professionals.'There is a very specific pool of people that we are trying to pick up from and it is a very tough process of picking up the right people because these are going to be the regulators, these are going to be the inspectors, these are going to take care of the safety,' said Naidu.'So the recruitment process is also a very rigorous process and it has been a continuing process and we are putting more pressure so that the timelines for the recruitment also come down,' he added.The need for a strong civil aviation regulatory body with adequate manpower is now seen as an urgency after the tragic accident Air India flight AI-171 on June 12, which led to 260 casualties, including passengers, flight crew and fatalities on the ground.The aircraft crashed a few seconds after takeoff from the Ahmedabad International Airport. The preliminary report of the accident highlighted that aberration with the fuel switches in the cockpit was a major factor which led to the accident.
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