The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), the aviation regulator, has suspended Vikram Mohan Dayal, vice president-training, Vistara, due to unsatisfactory conversion training. He had joined only in 2020.
Pilots undergo conversion training when they switch from one type of aircraft to another, for instance, from a narrow-body aircraft to a wide-body one. The three-stage training process is spread over 45 days, with the pilots flying the aircraft under supervision in the fourth stage.
However, amidst flight disruptions and the chaos across airports, the DGCA found that there had been oversights in the training process and about a dozen pilots had failed to be trained on time.
Post thorough investigation into the matter, the DGCA issued a showcase notice to Dayal, who was responsible for the conversion training of the said pilots. When he did not respond in a satisfactory manner, the DGCA went ahead and suspended him.
In recent times, the DGCA has become rather strict. In March, it decided to implement new duty norms for pilots starting 1 June, 2024. The new norms are to ensure more time for rest and minimise night-time flying for pilots. However, the airlines had sought the implementation to be postponed as they would need to hire more pilots and train them to be able to adhere to the new norms. These new norms are being enforced by the DGCA following recent instances of pilot deaths. In a recent case, a pilot had died of a cardiac arrest just before he was to fly. These deaths were attributed to the taxing flying schedules of the pilots, which was taking a toll on their health.
