4-member DGCA team visits Ajit Pawar plane crash site in Baramati

A four-member team of senior officials from the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has inspected the site of last month’s plane crash near Baramati in Pune district that claimed the lives of Maharashtra deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar and four others.

During their visit on Wednesday, the officials reviewed CCTV footage and video recordings related to the 28 January crash, local authorities said.

Pawar was travelling aboard a Learjet aircraft along with Captain Sumit Kapoor, co-pilot Capt. Shambhavi Pathak, Personal Security Officer Vidip Jadhav and flight attendant Pinky Mali when the aircraft went down near Baramati airport. All five on board were killed.

In a statement issued after the incident, the Ministry of Civil Aviation noted that Baramati operates as an “uncontrolled airfield,” meaning it does not have a dedicated Air Traffic Control (ATC) unit. Instead, traffic information is provided by instructors or pilots associated with local flying training organisations.

Union civil aviation minister K. Ram Mohan Naidu had earlier said that the investigation into the crash would be conducted in a time-bound manner.

Soon after the accident, teams from the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) and the DGCA visited the site. The aircraft’s Black Box has since been recovered and is expected to play a key role in determining the sequence of events that led to the crash.

Separately, the Maharashtra Crime Investigation Department (CID) initiated its own probe on 30 January.

Meanwhile, NCP (SP) MLA Rohit Pawar, nephew of the late Ajit Pawar, has raised questions about the circumstances leading up to the crash. He has suggested there could be grounds to suspect sabotage and has called for a comprehensive investigation involving multiple expert agencies.

With PTI inputs