National carrier Air India says operations will be normal in the face of a staff strike which starts from April 2 on account of unpaid salary dues of about R900 crore.
?There is no threat of any strike from any of the registered unions of Air India employees and operations will continue to be normal,? the airline said in a statement.
However, pilots, engineers, cabin crew and ground staffers said that they will go on strike as the airline has failed to make any commitment toward paying certain components of their salary, which has been due since November.
Seven of Air India?s 14 unions have formed a joint forum to ensure their dues are paid, and will take a final call on the strike on Tuesday. The unions include Indian Pilots? Guild or IPG representing the erstwhile Indian Airlines pilots, the employees? union, service engineers? union, the maintenance engineers? union, the cabin crew association, the technicians? association, and the Indian Commercial Pilots Association (ICPA) representing 800 pre-merger Air India pilots. Only the Air Corporation Employees Union, representing some of the erstwhile Indian Airlines ground staff have decided not to support the strike.
?We have around eight components in our salaries and the airline has failed to pay seven of them since November,? an engineer who is part of the joint forum told FE. ?The same has been happening to our other colleagues and the outstanding dues are now anywhere between R800 crore to R900 crore.?
A spokesperson for the IPG said that the unions are required to serve a minimum notice of two weeks before going on strike. ?We gave notice to the management on March 7, so we are meeting that requirement,? said the spokesperson.
?Our salary?s fixed component hasn?t been paid since December and allowances haven?t been paid since November,? the spokesperson added.
?The management has only proposed to pay us our full salaries for the next three months. There is no assurance yet on when the dues will be cleared,? said the engineer quoted above. ?We met chairman Rohit Nandan and he said the dues of the last few months will be cleared within a week of getting the R4,000-crore equity infusion from the government, but he couldn?t give us a fixed date.?
