Nine co-pilots have resigned from Air India to join IndiGo in protest against the state-owned carrier’s decision to place them on contractual employment.

Thirty other co-pilots are also evaluating offers from IndiGo and other carriers.

These co-pilots had collectively written to the Civil Aviation Ministry and the Director-General of Civil Aviation recently, alleging that Air India’s refusal to place them on its permanent rolls violates the terms of their offer-letters.

Of late, AI has been losing pilots in large numbers to the competition. Around 50 pilots moved on from Air India this year after it cut allowances by about 15 per cent.

In fact, wage rationalisation has been a contentious issue ever since the merger of the carrier with the then Indian Airlines seven years ago. AI pilots say they are being paid 25 per cent less post-merger.

Confirming the latest exodus of the nine co-pilots, all of whom were trained on the narrow-body Airbus A320 aircraft, a spokesperson for Air India said: “We had offered them contracts with terms that were more or less similar to what permanent employees were getting. They refused it as they wanted permanent terms.” In a bid to reduce losses, AI has been taking stringent measures to cut its cost overheads.

Contractual employment helps in reducing the wage bill, and hence, most airlines now hire staffers through this route.

Counter new players

Though IndiGo officials did not confirm the news, industry watchers say that the carrier has offered lucrative packages to these co-pilots.

It wants to build crew and expand aggressively so that it can counter new players such as Air Asia and Vistara. IndiGo, which is the country’s largest carrier by market share, currently operates a fleet of 85 A320 aircraft.

The 39 AI first officers were trained at the Indira Gandhi Rashtriya Uran Akademi, before being given campus offers in 2010.

Para 3 of the AI offer letter states that on completion of training, the individual would be appointed as a co-pilot, on the pay scale specified therein. However, in October this year, the officers were offered the co-pilot post on fixed-term contracts, which they refused to accept.

In the letter to the ministry, a copy of which was seen by BusinessLine , the co-pilots said they are being paid an ad-hoc amount of ₹1.5 lakh gross (monthly) since October 2013, irrespective of the number of hours flown.

AI is withholding their entitlements to force them into signing the contracts for fixed-term employment, the co-pilots allege.

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