Aviation India: Careers

New Delhi: As frequent cancellation and delay of planes plagued the national carrier Air India, the government said there was a shortage of pilots in the country.
It has been estimated that in the next five years 5,000 additional pilots would be required for scheduled operations and 1,000 pilots for non-scheduled and private operations, Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel told Rajya Sabha.
The government has taken various steps to reduce the gap between demand and supply of skilled pilots.
These include conditionally increasing the age limit to 65 years for pilots for exercising the privileges of their licences for commercial transport operations under prescribed conditions, upgradation and modernisation of training infrastructure of Indira Gandhi Rashtriya Uran Akademi to enhance its training capacity.
It also plans to set up of a world class flying training institute at Gondia, Maharashtra, and assistance to flying clubs by allocating trainer aircraft through Directorate General of Civil Aviation.
20/11/07 Press Trust of India/NDTV.com