Committee formed to reinstate sacked Air India pilots, court told

A committee has been formed for the reinstatement of terminated Air India pilots, the Delhi High Court was informed Friday.

Deputy Chief Labour Commissioner S.K. Chand said this in a final report on a conciliation meeting between Air India management and its pilots. 

Chand, following the court's order, submitted the report to Justice Reva Khetrapal and told the court that the committee would examine the individual requests of the terminated pilots on a case-to-case basis.

"Prolonged discussions were held between the parties in a very conducive atmosphere," the report said. 

"The management representatives submitted that in connection with the demand of reinstatement of terminated pilots, it may be stated that a committee has been constituted," it said.

The Delhi High Court had July 9 told the Air India management and a section of its pilots, who recently called off their 58-day-old strike, to hold conciliation talks daily before the deputy chief labour commissioner till the dispute was resolved.

Justice Khetrapal, accepting the report, posted the matter for July 16.

Saying that committee would examine the individual request of terminated pilots, Chand, in the report, said: "The said committee will examine the individual request of the terminated pilots on case to case basis. The terminated pilots are required to send the request letter/application for considering their cases."
The report also submitted that the Indian Pilots' Guild reiterate that all pilots be re-instated on an urgent basis without any discrimination. 

It also said that the deputy chief labour commissioner had requested the management that "the entire process of examination of the representations should be completed by the committee at the earliest but not later than 23 July".

"The management is also requested to consider all the cases of termination of pilots equally sympathetically and without any discrimination in the light of High Court direction given on July 3 and July 9," the report said.

In the conciliation proceedings held from July 10 to 12, representatives of the airlines' management assured Chand that the cases of terminated pilots would be considered sympathetically.

The committee constituted in connection with the demand of reinstatement of the pilots comprised of senior executives K.M. Unni, SBO head-MRO (Airframe), N.K. Jain, director (personnel) and R. Harihar, ED (projects) and ED (IR &I).

The court in an earlier hearing had asked the management to consider the reinstatement of pilots terminated from service "sympathetically and expeditiously".

The pilots having allegiance to the Indian Pilots' Guild had called off their stir after the Air India management July 3 assured the high court that it would "sympathetically" consider their grievances, including the reinstatement of the 101 sacked pilots.