Tribal boy with 260 hours flying experience now a cabbie - India - The Times of India
NEW DELHI: A Scheduled Tribe boy from Hyderabad wanted so desperately to become a pilot, he took a bank loan to pay for the training and notched
up 267 hours of flying, 17 more than is required for a Commercial Pilot’s Licence (CPL). But, instead of ending up in the cockpit, he now drives a taxi in Hyderabad.
P Chandan Chakravarthy of the Kondakappu tribe could not manage to get his dreams take wing but the lad clearly possessed an extraordinary level of determination.
He enrolled at the Andhra Pradesh FLying Club (now known as AP Aviation Academy) in April 1995. Back then, every hour of flying cost Rs 600. By 2001, when he accumulated 267 hours, the cost had spiralled to Rs 2,800 per hours. A resolute Chakravarthy took a bank loan of Rs 7.5 lakh.
He applied to the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) for his CPL but the DGCA turned him down saying his basic qualification — 10+2 from the Aeronautical Society of India — was not recognized. Chakravarthy moved the AP High Court, but was told the courts could do little about a DGCA policy decision.
Undeterred, the lad went back to school, passed the class 12 exam all over again and applied for a CPL once again, in 2006. But the DGCA turned him down again saying he had not flown 200 hours in the last five years. (By 2006, the criteria had changed from 250 flying hours to 200).
In effect, if Chakravarthy wanted to pursue his dream against all odds, he would have to start afresh and painfully clock up flying hours, each of which now costs Rs 10,000. He would have to invest another Rs 20 lakh.
Despite hurdles, Chakravarthy, did not give up hope overall but in the short term, he decided to drive a taxi to feed his family and pay off the bank loan. In the meantime, he pleaded with the DGCA to exempt him from the mandatory 200 flying hours.
Chakravarthy says he could, at best, meet requirements for CPL renewal, that is 25 hours of flying, which includes 15 hours of solo, four hours of cross country covering 250 nautical miles, five night landings, five hours of instrument flying and tripple test or day, night and instrument test. “It will take me six more months. But to ask for a repeat of entire flying hours is beyond my means,” he says.
Now, he has managed to persuade Congress Working Committee Member Oscar Fernandes to write to civil aviation minister Praful Patel, requesting that his case to be dealt with on humanitarian grounds rather than within rule-bound parameters.
Chakravarthy, who has presented his case afresh to the DGCA, now waits to hear the decision that could mean he either gets to the cockpit or behind his taxi’s steering wheel.