New Delhi: Under the Federal Aviation Administration's (FAA's) international aviation safety programme, India has once again retained Category I status. The FAA determines whether a nation's oversight of its air carriers that operate in or seek to operate into the US or codeshare with a US air carrier complies with safety standards set by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) through its International Aviation Safety Assessment (IASA) programme.
According to a statement by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), India continues to maintain its FAA IASA Category 1 status which was last assessed in July 2018.
FAA hails DGCA
"FAA has stated that DGCA has demonstrated a commitment towards ensuring an effective safety oversight of India's aviation system and appreciated the positive manner in which DGCA has worked with them," the statement said.
Facility to Air carriers of Category 1 nations
Further, the DGCA claimed that the country's categorization as a Category 1 comes at a time when Indian aviation is experiencing rapid growth and air carriers in India have significant capacity induction and expansion plans.
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"Air carriers of Category 1 countries are permitted to operate/ expand their services to destinations in the US and codeshare with US air carriers," it added.
Last year, in the ICAO audit, India's global ranking climbed significantly. The country scored an Effective Implementation (EI) of 85.65% from the previous EI of 69.95%
(With PTI inputs)
