Jet strike off,sacked pilots back on board

The five-day old strike by hundreds of pilots of Jet Airways ended late on Saturday night with the private airline....

The five-day old strike by hundreds of pilots of Jet Airways ended late on Saturday night with the private airline agreeing to unconditionally take back four pilots it had sacked for forming a trade union and the pilots agreeing to resume flying at the earliest. The rapprochement means most Jet flights will begin to operate normally from Sunday morning,ending one of the worst airline disruptions in the country in recent years.

The deadlock between the two sides was resolved after hours of talks in Mumbai on Saturday,a day after negotiations in the presence of the Chief Labour Commissioner in Delhi had come to a naught apparently over conditions set by the management over the future role of the National Aviators Guild (NAG),the new union that triggered the crisis.

Under the compromise reached today,the two sides agreed to form an internal grievance redressal mechanism which would exist alongside NAG. This panel would look into issues raised by pilots and other employees and would consist of five members of NAG and five from the management,including two board members,two senior flight operations officials and the CEO.

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At the Delhi meeting on Friday,Jets executive director Saroj Dutta had placed the managements proposals to the pilots and the latter had promised to respond to them. But that response had not come until late on Saturday evening.

NAG President Captain Girish Kaushik said earlier on Saturday that the guild was trying its best to come to an amicable solution with the management and the only stumbling block was their difference over the formation of NAG. According to them,the formation of the pilots guild would be disadvantageous to Jet, said Kaushik.

They say that when we start flying,well take back the boys (pilots) and we say that first take back the pilots and well start flying, he had said referring to another technical difference.

The strike saw more than 200 flights being cancelled every day with losses estimated at around $8 million per day and thousands of passengers were inconvenienced. It also caused other airlines to raise their fares to accommodate the rush.

(With Smita Aggarwal in Delhi)

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