EXPRESS EXCLUSIVE -- Air India pilots `hijack' London-Chicago flight

EXPRESS EXCLUSIVE -- Air India pilots `hijack' London-Chicago flight
SWATI CHATURVEDI

NEW DELHI, MARCH 9: Anywhere else, they would have been hauled up, even sacked; their airline taken to the cleaners. But this is Air India, its pilots can hijack a flight, force over 400 passengers off, cause a loss of over Rs 80 lakh -- and, most likely, fly away. Because they want to show solidarity with their colleagues whose relatives couldn't be accommodated on board.

So on February 17, it was as if an epidemic had spread just in Air-India. The pilots of A-I Flight 129 from Mumbai to London and Chicago reported ``sick.'' When the relief pilots were summoned, they too reported sick.

The result: The flight was cancelled, 435 passengers who had started boarding the aircraft were stranded. That night, A-I lost Rs 80 lakh and lots of goodwill -- and the airline had to arrange two special flights to clear the backlog.

Not that anyone in Air-India seems outraged. Because behind this sickness is a story of blackmail so typical to A-I. The incident which started it all had happened a week earlier when the A-I management threatened to take action against Captain R S Sodhi and I M S Gill for delaying Flight A-I 101 to London-New York on February 10. Gill and Sodhi wanted four A-I staff on leave (SOL) to be accommodated on an already overbooked flight. In other words, they wanted fare-paying, legitimate passengers offloaded to make way for their friends.

The A-I management said they would issue show-cause notices to the pilots who then decided to strike back.

So Captain P M Pant, the commander of Flight 129, reported ``sick'' on February 17. When the relief pilots were told to report for Flight 129, they too reported ``sick'' one after the other. They included Captain K. Kannan, V. Sachdeva and Captain Khariwal.

A-I did not have any option but to cancel the flight. The official reason: ``Shortage of commanders'' which A-I says is currently under investigation.

This isn't the first time that pilots are blackmailing the management to make sure their friends and relatives are given priority. Early last month, sources say, a captain delayed the Mumbai-Delhi-Hong Kong flight when the ground staff said they could not accommodate his two daughters on board. He threatened to report ``sick'' and cancel the flight.

He was placated by the in-flight supervisor who offered him the ``jump seats'' which, according to norms, are reserved only for the cabin crew. The flight finally took off but A-I sources say his threats could be heard by passengers near the check-in counter. Says an A-I official: ``When pilots make these threats in front of passengers, what happens to the image of the airlines?''

When contacted by The Indian Express, Jitendra Bhargava, director A-I confirmed that no action had been taken against any pilot but that Flight 129 was cancelled and that it is being investigated.

The present system which involves off-loading fare-paying passengers to accommodate the ``pilot's passengers'' started in 1996 when the then A-I MD Brijesh Kumar allowed a fare-paying passenger to be offloaded to accommodate the pilot's wife on a London-New York flight.

After this, the Indian Pilots Guild (IPG) and the management have had a running battle on this issue. The management has been saying that the accommodation of free passages is a perquisite which is subject to load. The IPG has never agreed. The only time there was any unanimity on the issue was when the Income Tax authorities in 1991 asked A-I to explain the scheme since they felt it should be subject to tax.

A-I pilots have been telling the management that the four seats of the crew-rest area which are not sold to the public should be made available to them to accommodate their free passages. Besides, the pilots have also been fighting for the eight jump-seats which are reserved for cabin crew in every flight. A-I Chairman and Secretary Civil Aviation Ravindra Gupta held a meeting with the Indian Pilots Guild (IPG) yesterday on the issue. No marks for guessing what will happen next.