The move to automate air traffic control at the Chennai airport seems to have hit rough weather as the US consulate is yet to issue visas to the team of 31 air traffic control officials and communication engineers chosen to attend a training programme at Raytheon's facility in the US.
Raytheon has bagged the Rs 42-crore contract for the project and training was scheduled to begin on November 4 and 5. "But the dates were tentative," said a source at the airport.
Selected officials attended interviews at the consulate on different dates in mid-October but they were not issued the visas immediately. The consulate staff told them they would be informed about the status of their applications. It's been over two weeks now but none of them have heard anything from the consulate. An online check shows their applications are pending.
"It seems the consulate has kept all the applications on hold even though Raytheon has vouched for them. The consulate officers did not state any reason for not issuing the visas immediately," said the source.
The Airports Authority of India (AAI) has now written to the US consulate about the importance of the training programme and asked it to speed up the visa process. AAI is also thinking of refering the issue to the Union civil aviation ministry.
The officials are being taken by Raytheon to its facility in Boston for training in installation, operation and maintenance of the automation procedure at the Chennai airport. The training programme, that extends from one week to three weeks, is part of the business contract Raytheon has signed with AAI.
The training session is likely to get postponed further to January because of the Christmas and
Read more: ATC automation: officials yet to get visa to attend training programme in US - The Times of India New Year holidays in the US. "The delay in issuing visas may affect installation of automation of air traffic system, which is already going slow," the official added.
This is not the first time that AAI's plans got entangled in US visa restrictions. About two months ago, the US consulate in Chennai rejected visas for an executive director and a joint general manager who were scheduled to travel to inspect a couple of equipment the authority had ordered from USA. Hence, AAI had to nominate another official from Delhi who could travel after the US embassy cleared his visa.
AAI soutnern region Regional Executive director D Devaraj said "getting visa for the selected officers should not be a problem. They have to follow some procedures. I have written a letter to the consulate to speed up the issuing of visa."
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