ICAO audit of Indian civil aviation sector to begin next week

UN watchdog ICAO will start its safety oversight audit of India's aviation sector from November 6 and the team is likely to review the functioning of various operators, including GoAir, according to officials.
The audit by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) is crucial for the fast-growing Indian aviation sector as the findings carry a lot of weight globally.
This also comes at a time when India has emerged as one of the fastest growing domestic aviation markets in the world, clocking double-digit growth for 37 straight months till end of September this year.
Officials said the ICAO audit would be from November 6 to 16. As part of the audit work, the team is scheduled to visit select facilities in the national capital, Mumbai, Chennai and some other cities, they added.

A senior DGCA official told PTI that the audit would mainly focus on the areas of licensing, airworthiness and operations besides aspects related to organisation and legal framework.
The official also said that a five-member team of ICAO would be conducting the audit.

When asked about the upcoming ICAO audit, civil aviation secretary R N Choubey said, "we are ready".
In December 2015, the UN body had carried out a similar review under its Universal Safety Oversight Audit Programme (USOAP), in which India reportedly scored better than the global average in airworthiness, air navigation services, operations and licensing.
Sources said the ICAO team would be visiting a few training organisations, facilities of air operators as well as approved maintenance, design and manufacturing organisations.

Tentatively, the team is likely to take stock of the facilities of budget airline GoAir and Air Charter Services in the national capital. They might also visit the facilities of Kestrel Aviation and Air India Charters in Mumbai, sources added.
Among the training organisations, the team is likely to visit the Bombay Flying Club, Hyderabad-based Wings Aviation or Allahabad-based Civil Aviation Training College.
Sources said the facilities of Blue Dart Aviation in Chennai and Indamer Mjets Airports Services in the national capital could be visited by the ICAO team.
The team could visit any or all of these facilities and also have a look at aircraft, they added.

Queries sent to ICAO seeking comments on the upcoming audit remained unanswered.
To ensure global aviation safety measures are complied with, the ICAO regularly carries out the universal safety oversight audit of its member states.
After an audit in 2012, ICAO had placed India in its list of 13 worst-performing nations. Subsequently, a similar exercise carried out by US regulator Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in 2014. The FAA had downgraded India's aviation safety ranking, bringing it below Pakistan and at par with countries like Ghana, Barbados and Bangladesh.
Indian airlines were not allowed to add new routes to the US or sign commercial agreements with US airlines during this period. The rating was restored to the top category in 2015.

Registering a growth of nearly 17 per cent, domestic airlines carried 95.83 lakh passengers in September this year, the DGCA data showed.
In the year-ago period, the number stood at 82.30 lakh passengers.