The Maldives government faced a lot of criticism by the locals over the fact that the helicopters gifted by the indian government are being piloted by Indian army and not by local pilots. During a news conference held, addressing these criticisms, Chief of Defence Force of the Maldives Major General Abdullah Shamaal said that they did not hire local pilots as locally we do not have eligible pilots to run the helicopters. But they will hire eligible trained locals to operate helicopters soon.

Mr Abdullah Shamaal has also raised concerns over the wages of the pilots being a challenge to hire locals. As per him, around MVR 80,000 is earned by pilots and providing that amount to military officers working as pilots, will also need to increase pay for other technical areas as well.

He has also mentioned that already the maintenance of these helicopters are run by the support of Indian government under mutual understanding agreements along with coast guard navy ship maintenance in every 2 years as well. Hence a foreigner operating the helicopter does not lose our rights over these helicopters.

It has been noticed that many officers of the Indian army are currently in the Maldives to look after the helicopters for which the government has received a lot of criticism and backlash by the locals.