Hyderabad: Virtually sounding a warning to the striking Air India pilots, Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh on Sunday said the government is not waiting for the pilots to return to work but making plans to move ahead.
Reminding the pilots and other employees that their survival was linked to Air India, he said that nobody is going to give anymore public money to the airline and "they will not survive for too long" if the company does not become competitive.
"We are not waiting. We are making plans. If you take the pilots trained in V-737 or Airbus 320, (in) three to six months they can be trained to fly these planes. "So, in our plan for revival, when we implement Dharmadhikari report, we have to be very patient and firm at the same time.
"There will be many such hiccups on the way," he told reporters on the sidelines of a book release function. ...
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05:49 PM, Jun 17, 2012
New Delhi: Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh on Monday constituted a four-member panel to examine Air India's route profitability, even as the strike by pilots of the national carrier continued for the 21th day, taking its losses to more than Rs 300 crore (about $55 mn). The decision came after the minister reviewed the status of flights on domestic and international routes which are non-profitable. According to a ministry official,...
01:51 AM, May 29, 2012
Mumbai: Air India board will meet in Mumbai on Monday to discuss the nearly three-week-old strike by over 200 pilots and a host of financial issues. Airline sources said the board is likely to consider the next steps to be taken to deal with the strike, spearheaded by the now derecognised Indian Pilots Guild. The airline has sacked 101 pilots and is mulling hiring new pilots to restore normalcy its...
05:34 AM, May 28, 2012
New Delhi: It's the 16th day of the Air India crisis. The cracks between the airline management and the Indian Pilots Guild seemed to have gone deeper. The Pilots Guild accused the management of indulging in financial malpractice and mismanagement that has caused the airline losses worth Rs 4,300 crore. "Mismanagement of the company's resources, hostility towards the welfare of erstwhile Air India employees and forced merger are the main...
02:16 PM, May 23, 2012
New Delhi: The Air India crisis has entered the 15th day on Tuesday and there is still no clarity on when the pilots' strike will end. Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh met 13 Air India unions on Monday to discuss the turnaround plan and the future of the national carrier. While sources claimed that one of the requests by the unions was to reinstate the 71 sacked pilots, the Air...
08:49 AM, May 22, 2012
New Delhi: The rift between the Air India staff and the government has worsened with the government now accusing the employees of causing massive financial losses. Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh told Parliament on Thursday that the Vigilance Department was investigating 161 cases of irregularities. The ministry accepted that there has been an increase in tipsy pilots and cabin crew. It also says that the pilots allegedly pocketted over Rs...
01:18 PM, May 17, 2012
New Delhi: The government's appeal to the striking pilots of Air India have fallen on deaf ears. The strike has entered its ninth day on Wednesday. Fifteen international flights from Delhi and Mumbai were cancelled on Wednesday. Speaking in the Lok Sabha on Tuesday, Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh had said that the government would hear the pilots' woes unconditionally as long as they returned to work. The strike has...
08:56 AM, May 16, 2012
New Delhi: National carrier Air India seems to be in major trouble. As many as 10 out of 34 international routes have been cancelled due to the ongoing strike by the pilots. According to reports, the frequency of flights on eight routes has been reduced from seven to two per week. The routes that have been cancelled include Mumbai-Newark, Delhi-Toronto, Mumbai-London, Delhi-Hong Kong-Seoul and Delhi-Hong Kong-Osaka. Besides, the national carrier...
05:32 PM, May 15, 2012
New Delhi: There has been no end to the Air India crisis as the pilots' strike entered the eighth day on Tuesday. Air India cancelled around 10 international flights from Delhi and Mumbai this morning. The pilots sent a medical report to the Civil Aviation Minister saying that ill health was an excuse to skip work. While Ajit Singh slammed the report, an Air India team visited the homes of...
11:10 AM, May 15, 2012
Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh repeated that he won't talk to the Air India pilots till they resume work. ...
01:04 PM, May 14, 2012
New Delhi: There has still been no end to Air India's troubles. It's been a week since its pilots went on a strike that has so far cost the already debt-ridden national carrier almost Rs 96 crore so far. The Maharaja's contingency plan was supposed to take effect on Monday but now sources say that it hasn't even been finalised as yet. That is because Air India's Executive Pilots Association...
07:52 AM, May 14, 2012
New Delhi: There seem to be no signs of an end to the deadlock between the striking Air India pilots, the management and the government as all of them continued to stick to their stands. Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh asked the striking pilots to first apologise to the passengers if they wished to hold talks with the government. "I appeal to the pilots to give first priority to the...
02:32 PM, May 12, 2012
New Delhi: There seems to be no end in sight to the Air India crisis. The pilots' strike entered the fifth day on Saturday and passengers continued to suffer as 15 flights were cancelled. Following is the list of the 15 Air India flights cancelled on Saturday: AI 120 from Delhi to Frankfurt cancelled AI 990 from Delhi to Jeddah cancelled AI 348 from Delhi to Mumbai cancelled AI 112...
07:47 AM, May 12, 2012
New Delhi: There seems to be no end in sight to the Air India crisis. The pilots' strike entered the fifth day on Saturday and passengers continued to suffer as 15 international flights were cancelled. On Friday, Air India sacked 25 more pilots taking the total number of sacked pilots to 71 in four days, even as the pilots reached out for talks. Air India also wrote to the Directorate...
07:34 AM, May 12, 2012
New Delhi: The government moved to control airfares on Friday even as the pilots strike in Air India and Kingfisher led to several flights being cancelled. The government said that it won't slap the Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA) on the pilots for now after Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Friday over the crisis. There seems to be some hope amidst the turbulence for...
03:40 PM, May 11, 2012
New Delhi: Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh on Friday met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to discuss the Air India crisis. After the meeting, Ajit Singh said that the government was not being inflexible and was open to talks. "The government is not being inflexible or adamant," Ajit Singh said. The Aviation Minister also said that the government had no plans of imposing the Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA) against the...
12:43 PM, May 11, 2012
New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Friday refused to entertain Air India's contempt petition against the Indian Pilots Guild and asked Air India to sit with pilots and sort out the differences. A bench headed by Justice T S Thakur said that they (pilots) have done nothing which amounts to contempt of court and suggested the airlines to speak with them to sort out the differences. "They have done nothing...
12:19 PM, May 11, 2012
New Delhi: Flights continued to be hit following the strike by Air India and Kingfisher Airlines pilots on Friday. Passengers continued to bear the brunt as several flights were cancelled. The seven Kingfisher Airlines flights cancelled on Friday were: IT 2314 - Delhi " Jaipur IT 4354 " Delhi " Shimla IT 4302 " Delhi " Udaipur IT 4358 - Delhi " Kulu IT 2636 - Delhi " Chandigarh IT...
11:38 AM, May 11, 2012
New Delhi: Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh on Friday said that he hoped that the Air India pilots who have called in sick get well soon. "The pilots have reported sick. So, I hope they get well soon," Ajit Singh said. In a warning of the sorts, he also said that he hoped that Air India crisis doesn't deepen. "I hope things do not go from bad to worse and...
09:26 AM, May 11, 2012
New Delhi: The Indian Aviation industry has been hit by the pilots of two airlines going on strike. Four days after the Air India pilots went on strike, calling in sick, 72 Kingfisher airlines pilots in the north India region have also called in sick, demanding pending salaries. The Air India crisis worsens The Air India crisis entered its fourth day on Friday and the situation has been turning from...
07:36 AM, May 11, 2012
