‘Air safety rules wilfully violated at Mumbai airport’

Stating that the case of the NOCs for construction work on 11 sub-plots dating back to 2011 were investigated by the CBI, Mangala has said in response to a query filed under the Right to Information Act that the GVK-led MIAL has “wilfully violated air safety rules with the full connivance of MOCA/DGCA/AAI officials which shows that there is systemic corruption in the Civil Aviation ministry”.

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She adds that the violations of air safety rules and procedures have been “for commercial gains at the cost of endangering the lives of unwary air passengers”.

The other serious allegation pertains to the installation of a Jet Blast Shield (JBS), which deflects high energy exhaust from jet engines. Mangala has said a JBS installed in front of a localiser antenna (a component of the Instrument Landing System) on the main runway violates rules stipulating that anything installed between the localiser antenna and the end of a runway must be frangible, or designed to disintegrate. The “non-frangible and hence dangerous” JBS is a cause for worry in view of recent aviation accidents, she claims.

“It is high time that my higher-ups in AAI/MOCA took the long overdue corrective step and direct GVK/MIAL to remove the non-frangible JBS, instead of waiting for an accident that will reveal all their collective negligence,” Mangala writes.

The DGM’s letter is in response to a Right to Information request filed by activist Vishwas Bhamburkar about action taken on safety issues at the airport.

MIAL representatives were unavailable for a comment despite repeated attempts.

Regional Executive Director (Western Region-AAI) A K Sharma, her superior, said the JBS was not in the jurisdiction of his office. On the NOCs to a private builder, Sharma told The Indian Express that no violations were found.

Mangala has also alleged that her seniors in AAI have permitted GVK/MIAL to operate despite a CAG report in 2013-14 showing “irrefutable evidence of the huge financial loss of thousands of crores of rupees to the country caused by the criminal negligence of the concerned officials in MOCA/AAI by their allowing GVK/MIAL to defraud AAI/GOI”.

Other allegations in the letter to Bhamburkar include her claims that air-miss/ATC incidents have been suppressed.

Speaking to The Indian Express on Monday, Mangala said these complaints were conveyed to Sharma. “I have proof of these allegations. If I was wrong, I would not have survived in this organization and would have been trampled upon,” she added.

In her note, she says her own own seniors “are the wrongdoers” and have hence “remained obdurate in not taking any corrective action”.

mumbai.newsline@expressindia.com