The report on the PIA Fokker aircraft crash at Multan on July 10, 2006 was not taken up by Senate Defence Committee on Wednesday. The report was to come up for discussion in the meeting of the Committee on Wednesday but the authorities sought refuge in the plea that the report was still confidential and should be made public.
Chairman Nisar Memon acceded to the request and left it at the discretion of Defence Minister to decide, thereby overlooking standing committee's role to oversee function of public organisations.
However, Senator Rukhsana Zuberi, a member of the Committee, talking to Business Recorder, demurred with this line of action. She said the tragedy occurred last year, killing 44 people.
Hence the public had an inherent right to know details of the tragedy and the cause of the crash. As yet, PIA had not been able to make the report public and was hiding facts under the pretext of secrecy.
She confided to the scribe that she would file a short notice question in the Senate about the crash. It may be pointed out that Senate standing committee in its meeting in September 2006, had directed Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) to submit the investigation report on Fokker crash.
On that occasion, Nisar Memon, Chair of the standing committee, had also expressed concern over the fact that the airline did not provide proper rest to its flight crew, and this could be the main cause of the crash. Though PIA stated it could be technical fault in one of the engines of the Fokker aircraft. Rukhsana Zuberi, Asif Jatoi, Dilawar Abbas Mushahid Hussain Sayed, and Naeem Hussain Chattha attended the meeting.
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