FIA arrests another pilot in fake licence scandal

KARACHI: Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) has arrested the second pilot from Islamabad in fake pilots’ licence scandal, ARY News reported on Tuesday.

As per details, FIA has arrested a pilot named Fahad Sultan who was trying to flee to the United Kingdom on a UK passport from New Islamabad International Airport.

According to FIA Deputy Director Rauf Sheikh, Fahad was arrested as he was nominated in fake pilots’ licence scandal case.

Pilot Fahad Sheikh has been shifted to Islamabad from Karachi, said FIA deputy director. Rauf Sheikh said that federal investigation agency is conducting raids for the arrest of other suspects in licence scandal.

The accused was allegedly involved in the issuance of Commercial Pilot Licence (CPL) and Airline Transport Pilot Licence (ATPL) by CAA on the basis of fake pilot licence exams.

Furthermore, the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) has unearthed a network -comprising of its employees and some pilots- allegedly involved in the fake pilots’ licenses scam.

According to sources, the CAA is carrying out raids for two accused allegedly involved in the scam after it has emerged that some of the aviation employees were using their frontmen to collect money for the fake licenses.

Read More: CAA to issue pilots’ licences via biometric system

They said that license branch employees allegedly received hundreds of thousands of rupees from each pilot for a paper and in return, another person was allowed to sit in place of the pilot.

“The CAA has acquired remand of some of the license branch officials and pilots,” they said adding that the span of the investigations has been expanded. “It has also been decided to register FIRs against these elements,” the sources said.