Stop taking trainees or face legal action: Pilots' union to Air India

Accusing Air India management of adding to the airline’s financial woes, its pilots’ body has opposed the recruitment of trainee cockpit crew in large numbers at a time when the company was reeling under a financial crunch.

The Indian Commercial Pilots Association (ICPA) also warned of legal action if the management did not stop the process of recruiting trainee pilots, saying the services of those already on the rolls could be used as they were “underutilised”.

In a letter to Air India CMD Arvind Jadhav, ICPA General Secretary S Sabu said the ICPA had in 2006 agreed to fly up to 90 hours per month and 240 hours each quarter.

However, the average flying hours of pilots dropped to 60 hours per month and even 40 hours in some cases, he said, adding “this clearly proves that we are underutilised”.

The drop in the average flying hours was primarily due to a reduction in the number of flights and capacity being undertaken by Air India and other carriers as part of cost-cutting measures to come out of the massive losses.

Air India recently advertised for induction of trainee pilots, while its wholly-owned subsidiary Alliance Air has started a process of recruiting type-rated and experienced pilots for its fleet of Boeing 737s, CRJ-700s and ATR 42-320s.

“In this context, it would be prudent to redeploy (existing) pilots to various fleet, depending on requirement, rather than induct fresh trainee pilots which will result in additional financial expenditure in the near future, as they too will have to be paid their wages and allowances,” Sabu said, adding “we fail to understand the reason” behind the recruitment drive started recently.

Sources said on an average a trainee pilot’s salary and allowances would come to around Rs 2 lakh per month, while their year-long training would cost about Rs 20-25 lakh. The number of trainees proposed to be taken is around 100.

Asking Air India management to “re-examine the matter and stop the process” of recruitment, Sabu said failing this, “the ICPA will be constrained to resort to legal action”.