According to the petition, the FTL and FDTL were being

governed by the Aircraft Rules along with the Memorandum of Settlement agreed on October one, 2008 between the Air India management and the employees union. Besides the cabin crew members, Indian Commercial Pilots' Association (ICPA), the union of erstwhile Indian Airlines, had also challenged the increase in FTL and FDTL. The petitioners had stated that as per the DGCA guidelines, FTL and FDTL were 11 and eight hours respectively. Howerever, after an agreement between the union and the Airlines, FTL and FDTL had been fixed at 9.5 and 6.5 hours respectively, the plea had also said. The Ministry had directed AI in September last year to follow the DGCA guidelines on FDTL for pilots and cabin crew on the ground that a comprehensive analysis had warranted the change. The analysis had found that barring one of the six FDTL parameters regarding 'Rest Period', all others followed by the carrier for its pilots and crew members were on the lower side compared to what was laid down by DGCA, an official statement had said. The other parameters included number of landings, maximum daily flight duty period, maximum daily flight time, weekly, monthly or annual limitation of flying hours, SOD (Staff on Duty) travel or positioning for duty. According to the analysis, the pilots were found operating flights for 6.5 hours on domestic and seven hours on international sectors, against the DGCA guidelines.