Air India gets 72,000 job applications for cabin crew; 1,752 for pilots

Tata Group-owned Air India on Thursday said it has received over 72,000 applications for cabin crew and 1,752 applications for pilots during the last two months.

The airline’s aggressive expansion plan, which has already seen 17 long-grounded aircraft return to the skies with 12 more to follow, necessitates a significant expansion in flying crew, the airline noted.

The airline has recently leased 25 narrow body and five wide body planes and they will join the fleet by 2023-end. Air India currently has 70 narrow body and 43 wide body planes in its fleet. Therefore, the airline's fleet size will increase from 113 planes to 143 planes by 2023-end.

Interest from management post-graduates with three years’ experience to fill ground based business roles has been similarly strong, with over 25,000 applications received in little more than one week, the airline said. 

On appointment, those selected will be placed in various functions in Air India including airport operations, commercial, engineering and human resources among others, and will form an important part of Air India’s internal talent and future leadership pipeline, it mentioned.

The airline said it had not recruited in non-operations areas for more than 15 years, is quickly adding talent in all spheres of its business, ranging from "commercial functions" like revenue management and network planning to "business support services" like human resources (HR) and finance to "operations" like inflight product design, ground, airport services, rostering and operations control.

The Tata Group took control of Air India on January 27 after winning the bid for the airline on October 8 last year. The airline's new Chief Executive Office (CEO) and Managing Director (MD) Campbell Wilson in August this year.

Suresh Dutt Tripathi, Chief Human Resources Officer, Air India, said on Thursday that an entire generation of workforce has missed the opportunity to work for Air India due to limited recruitment over the years. 

"The induction of new generation talent is also essential to bring about cultural change that will make Air India an employer of choice," Tripathi noted.

The initial response to our various job postings has been tremendous and the airline is committed to meeting the aspirations

of those seeking a fulfilling career with Air India, he mentioned.