The Indian Air Force has approached the Delhi High Court to recover dues amounting to nearly Rs 54 lakhs from former prime minister H D Deve Gowda for the use of official aircraft allegedly for non-official purposes.

The force has been trying to recover the dues from the former prime minister since 1996-97 when the alleged use of the IAF planes was made for purposes other than official, a series of RTI replies show.

"It is mentioned that Chandrashekhar, P V Narasimha Rao, H D Deve Gowda and V C Shukla had availed airlift facilities of IAF for non-official purposes during their tenure as prime ministers and cabinet minister," IAF had said in an RTI reply in 2008.

According to IAF, it has to recover dues of about Rs 5.91 crore from Chandrashekhar, Rs 54.61 lakh from Deve Gowda and Rs 4.60 lakh from former union minister V C Shukla. It had said the amount was due from their "political parties".

"A case for recovery of outstanding amount against former Prime minister H D Devegowda for his non-official use of IAF aircraft during his tenure as PM is pending in the court of Registrar, High Court of Delhi. The case is at an admission stage. The next date of hearing in July 1, 2010," the IAF said in the RTI reply dated June 23, 2010 on the issue.

The force said defence ministry has resorted to various legal and administrative measures including filing of civil suits to recover the amount.

The civil suit filed against Chandrashekhar in Delhi High Court in 2001 has been dismissed on January 24, 2008 as he passed away.

Based on the advise of ministry of law and justice, an appeal is proposed to be filed in the Delhi High Court to recover airlift dues from his legal heirs/political party," the Air Force had earlier said in an RTI reply dated June 30, 2008 to activist S C Agrawal.