The underlying reason for this crisis is the heavy losses that Air India is incurring. Its management, in the past had introduced ingenious methods, like changing the name from India Airlines to Indian, and then, with a few months gaps called for merger between Air India and renamed Indian.

 

However, these did not help in turning around the company and the situation therein went from bad to worse. And now, the proposal that caused the strike was introduced, asking pilots to accept pay cuts ranging between 50 to 70 per cent. Further, these cuts were only applicable to executive pilots.

 

The question that arises is, how can a company come out of a financial crisis by cutting the incentive based pay of employees and that too of a section that is responsible for spearheading the fleet with which it generates revenue. Jet airways faced a similar problem only a few weeks back. The same high handed behaviour led to a similar strike, causing a further loss of revenue.

 

One needs to understand that we no longer live in master-servant environment. Those sitting in higher places are also employees and not masters. Their stake in the company is much smaller than those who have spent years of devoted employment and tried to keep “Maharaja” flying. The chairman, the MD, the minister are frequent flyers and as such it is an over estimation that they and they alone know the solution to a company’s solution.

 

The Air India employees, including the executive pilots, have much higher stake in the company and also have much detailed knowledge about the company’s ills. It is in this background that the management ought to stop behaving like a child and get into dialogue with the pilots and other employees to turn around the company.

 

But are they really serious about the turnaround of Air India? If they are, then the first one to be attacked are the free-riders and defaulter of Air India dues. Further, the management should do its work by setting examples and in this connection they should lead by reducing their own wages by similar percentages.