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Mumbai: A crucial unit at the frontline of India’s air safety apparatus, meant to keep a check on aircraft fitness, lies half-empty and neglected.

India’s Directorate of Airworthiness (DAW), a unit within the Director General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), is meant to conduct surprise technical checks on aircraft and ensure that private airline operators are not compromising on passenger safety.

The job is crucial: within the DGCA, the DAW is meant to certify whether aircraft are “air-worthy”, which, as per the International Civil Aviation Organisation, means to check whether it is safe to fly. India’s DGCA, in its manual, admits that the DAW is meant to investigate defects in aircraft and “suggest corrective actions to arrest trends”, to “investigate major problems or defects”, and to perform “periodic and unannounced surveillance” checks on private airline operators to check if they are following safety norms. It is also meant to monitor the maintenance processes that airlines adopt, and verify that they aren’t cutting corners.

Yet, the DGCA has admitted, in a response to an Right to Information (RTI) query filed by this correspondent, that of the 310 total posts in the directorate, 133, i.e. 43% of them, are lying empty.

But even more worrying are the vacancies in the posts of airworthiness officers (AWO), the backbone of the DAW and the first line of oversight into aircraft safety and maintenance. Of the 121 posts created for such officers, only 47 have been filled by the DGCA. The remaining 74 lie empty, meaning a whopping 61% vacancy rate.

According to the DGCA’s RTI response, despite such a high rate of vacancies, the pace of recruitment has been unhurried and sluggish. Since 2022, the DGCA has been able to appoint only 20 airworthiness officers, rather than fill up all the vacant posts.

Also read: Half the Positions at DGCA Vacant, Says Civil Aviation Ministry

Air-safety experts and insiders in the DGCA said such vacancies render the DAW toothless and powerless to be able to........

© The Wire