ISLAMABAD, Pakistan: The plan which was crashed near Kohat in 2003 while carrying the then Air Chief Marshal Mushaf Ali Mir and eventually causing his death was defective, unserviceable and purchased at exorbitant rates, the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) was told on Monday.
The former Pakistan Air Force (PAF) Air Chief Marshal Mushaf Ali Mir, his wife Bilquis Mir and 16 others persons including some senior PAF officers died when the Fokker F-27 carrying them crashed on a mountain in fog near Kohat on February 20, 2003.
In a meeting of the PAC’s Sub-Committee on Monitoring and Implementation held under the chairmanship of Rana Afzal in Islamabad on Monday, the Director General Audit of Defense Services Malik Farrukh Abbas apprised the committee that Mushaf Mir’s aircraft was defective, unserviceable and purchased at exorbitant rates.
The PAC was given a briefing by auditors about implementation of its orders while the DG Defence Audit told while briefing the committee that in 2003, the concerned authority wrote a letter to the audit stating that the said plane crashed and former Air Chief Marshal Mushaf Ali Mir was martyred along with 10 other people.
But in 2008, again the concerned authority conveyed to the audit that the defective plane was being used for cargo service.
However, the officials from Pakistan Army informed the committee that the aircraft of former Air Chief was crashed due to the bad weather condition and negligence of the pilot.
During the meeting, the DG Defence Audit told the committee that the old and unserviceable aircraft was purchased against Rs83 million.
The DG Defence Audit said that after the inspection of a Fokker F-27 by team of Pakistan Navy on June 1, 1993, it appeared that the condition of the aircraft was alarming and its air worthiness was also doubtful.
Since its induction in Army, the aircraft had flown 11 hours only, he added.
The DG further stated that according to the auditors, the aircraft was very old with 46,865 airframe hours against the PN requirement of maximum 20,000 hours. The aircraft was ultimately transferred to the PAF, he added.
The PAC was further briefed by the audit officials that the aircraft in question was first tried to be inducted into the national carrier however the Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) refused to induct the aircraft. It was then tried to be handed over to the Navy which also refused to accept it.
The aircraft was property of the Ministry of Defence Production, according to the audit officials.
APP/DND
