PIA official sacked over ‘fake’ matric certificate

LAHORE: Pakistan International Airline (PIA) has terminated its Marketing Deputy General Manager from service on charges of fake matriculation certificate, The News has learnt. 

DGM Marketing Fayyaz Shah was terminated from the service after an ongoing probe found his matriculation certificate fake, a senior PIA official said on Tuesday. 

“We have terminated services of around 300 employees during the last few years on charges of having fake degrees”, the official said, adding cases of around 250 more employees are also under probe on the same charges. 

When contacted by The News, Fayyaz Shah confirmed that he was issued a termination letter by the PIA management a couple of days back but he didn’t receive that. The former DGM claimed his matriculation certificate was genuine but there was a difference of date of birth on it. “Difference of date of birth on a certificate was not a big issue but the PIA management made it an issue”, Fayyaz said. 

To a question, he said PIA’s probing body had issued him a show cause notice on a fake degree issue last year which he responded accordingly. I have approached the board concerned for verification of my matriculation certificate and the issue would be settled soon, Fayyaz said, adding the PIA management acted in haste in issuing my termination letter.

When contacted, a spokesman of the PIA said terminating employees on fake degrees was a routine matter as the management was verifying all degrees of the entire staff for the past few years. To a question, the spokesman said he didn’t know whether Fayyaz Shah had been terminated from the service. 

A number of employees, who have been terminated over failure of verification of their academic credentials, have sought the court’s shelter. Fayyaz Shah too moved the court this week, and according to him, the court has awarded him stay order over this decision.