The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) has given clean chit to 16, out of 17, Pakistani pilots associated with the Malaysian Airline.

The aviation authority has emailed the foreign airline the clearance of pilots from the ongoing process of scrutiny of degrees and certificates.

The Pakistani pilots have been getting through a ‘clean-up’ operation as the issue of ‘dubious credentials’ came to spotlight after the Karachi plane crash a couple of months ago.

The government has been claiming to have launched the operation after a forensic probe that lasted for more than a year but the opposition smelt a rat.

Defending the action against pilots, Aviation Minister Ghulam Sarwar Khan said last week 102 pilots of different airlines were grounded while 54 faced the music over dubious documents.

About pilots working with foreign airlines, the minister said of 54, 48 pilots associated with UAE Airline were cleared while nine out of 11 serving the Vietnam Airline and two of four working with Bahrain Airline got clearance.

He blamed the mess on the previous governments while ex-diplomate to the US Sherry Rehman in PPP rule (2008-13) said the  government ‘crashed’ the Pakistan International Airline (PIA) over issue of degrees and certificates of pilots as it wanted to sale it in the name of privatisation.