ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Air Force (PAF) has sought a $ 2 million (Rs 330 million) Technical Supplementary Grant (TSG) for maintenance of VVIP aircraft being used by the President and Prime Minister, official sources told Business Recorder.
PAF is maintaining two VVIP Gulfstream aircraft ( G-450 and G-IV) utilized by the President and Prime Minister of Pakistan. To ensure optimum availability of these aircraft for state duties, the aircraft are required to be maintained in the desired manner, ensuring their serviceability and fly worthy status in line with the standards defined by the OEM (original equipment manufacturer) and PAF.
In this regard, the Prime Minister had directed that Ministry of Defence be allocated the requisite funds under its demand from CFY 2020-21 onwards.
In order to ensure provisioning of smooth maintenance/spare support from M/s Gulfstream, USA, a yearly maintenance fund of Rs 330 million ($2 million) is required for CFY 2020-21 (@US $=Rs. 165/-). PAF argues that to ensure provisioning of a smooth maintenance/ spaces support from M/s Gulfstream, USA, a yearly maintenance fund is required for recoupment of M/s Gulfstream RRC. In this regard, an expenditure of approximately $2 million is estimated to meet the forecast expenditures planned out of the requested allocation as follows: (i) mandatory annual subscriptions; the estimated subscriptions as HAPP, CMP net, publications, INDS and Nav aircraft during each flying operation and maintenance/repair process are to be annually renewed - $0.5 million expenditure; (ii) pilots' simulator training; with an aim to maintain the desired professional competency of pilots in handling critical emergencies and flight conditions that cannot be practiced on aircraft, the crew is required to be subjected to simulator training at QEM facility, cost $0.3 million ;(iii) scheduled inspections requirements- procurement of mandatory/conditional spares is required for compliance of aircraft schedule inspections falling due at a set intervals during the NFY (6 C inspection of G-IV and 13 C inspection for G-450) cost $ 0.65 million; (iv) spares of unscheduled maintenance- the requirement for swift procurement of spares is entailed to address un-scheduled defects/maintenance tasks to keep aircraft in highest state of serviceability and readiness, cost $ 0.35 million; and (v) mandatory SBs/upgradation- the requirement for compliance of mandatory SBs issued by OEM at varying intervals, etc., cost $ 0.2 million.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2021