Mumbai: Aviation Minister Suresh Prabhu directed Tuesday his ministry’s secretary to hold an emergency meeting on the debt-ridden Jet Airways massively cancelling flights after grounding of a large part of its fleet.
“Directed Secretary, @MOCA GOI to hold an emergency meeting on grounding of flights by Jet Airways, advance bookings, cancellations, refunds and safety issues, if any,” Prabhu said in a tweet. “Asked him (civil aviation secretary) to get a report on Jet compliance issues immediately from DGCA,” he added.
Earlier Monday, Jet Airways engineers’ body wrote to aviation regulator DGCA, seeking its intervention in the recovery of their salary dues, saying non-payment was affecting their psychological condition which, in turn, was a ‘risk’ to the airline’s flight operations.
Monday afternoon, the DGCA had sent an e-mail to airlines asking them to send their representatives for a meeting at 12 noon Tuesday ‘to review the fares being offered by airlines’.
“It has been arduous for us to meet our financial requirements, result of which have adversely affected the psychological condition of aircraft engineers at work and therefore the safety of public transport airplanes being flown by Jet Airways across India and the world is at risk,” the Jet Aircraft Engineers Welfare Association (JAMEWA) said in a letter to the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA).
The letter, which has been accessed by this agency, stated: “While the senior management is finding a resolution to be in business, we the engineers who inspect, troubleshoot and certify the public transport airplanes for its airworthiness are in tremendous stress due to non-payment of salaries on time, since last seven months. As of now, three month’s salary is overdue to us.”
Cash-strapped Jet Airways had Monday said it had grounded four more planes, taking the number of aircraft that are non-operational due to non-payment of lease rentals to 41.
The JAMEWA has requested the DGCA to intervene in the matter. “Jet Airways’ senior management had a series of meetings with us to resolve our overdue salaries and after much deliberation, finally released a payment schedule in December 2018 which would clear our dues in full, by the end of this financial year. However, it defaulted on it and our confidence in the company’s commitments have shaken,” the letter said.
“We request you to kindly intervene and direct Jet Airways to clear our outstanding dues and pay us our salaries on time in future to enable us to continue deliver safe airplanes,” the letter further added.
According to the Jet Airways’ website, the airline has a fleet of 119 planes. For the past few weeks, passengers have been venting their ire on social media as the airline’s flight cancellations have increased gradually due to the rising number of grounded aircraft. Grappling with financial woes, the carrier has been looking at ways to raise fresh funds.
