The Chhattisgarh Government has decided to insure its pilots against ‘loss of Flying license’.
The Directorate of Civil Aviation is going for insurance of five pilots with a coverage of Rs 15 lakh each for a period of one year, officials stated.
Incidentally, the Federation of Indian Pilots which is a body for the professional advancement of pilots in the country in the year 1999 had launched a scheme to insure a pilot’s flying license as it believed that pilots need to be medically fit as in case of being declared medically unfit, they may lose their flying license.
This apart, the Chhattisgarh Government is also now preferring those helicopter pilots who have sufficient experience with flying in insurgency infested regions.
Chhattisgarh has a history of choppers being attacked by insurgents in the red zone. Even Indian Air Force (IAF) choppers had been hit from firing by rebels in heavily forested patches of Bastar region when they tried to land for evacuation of security personnel.
The Civil Aviation Directorate had put up a condition when hiring a helicopter recently that the operator would need to attach Certificate of operational experience in left Wing Extremism (lWE) areas issued by concerned state’s Police or Aviation Departments, sources stated.
The operators, sources stated, were also informed that the helicopter will be based at Jagdalpur—the district headquarters of insurgency infested Bastar district but will be required to operate in the entire State.
The Directorate stated the Company and the helicopter owner will have to provide a ‘No Objection Certificate’ (NOC) for operations of crew and helicopter in the entire Chhattisgarh region.