After more than 90 international and domestic flights were canlled on Wednesday due to cabin crew reporting sick.
New Delhi: In a latest development, Air India Express on Thursday fired at least 25 cabin crew members, a day after nearly 300 employees of the airline called in sick and switched off their phones. This development led to large-scale flight disruptions across the country. It is also being reported that the number of job terminations are likely to increase beyond 25 and the management is also likely to hold a townhall meeting with cabin crew members today.
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“Around 25 employees (cabin crew members) of Air India Express Airlines have been terminated after they didn’t report to work, and due to their behaviour, thousands of passengers suffered. The airline will be issuing a statement in the next 20 minutes,” Airline Sources told ANI.
After more than 90 international and domestic flights were canlled on Wednesday due to cabin crew reporting sick, Air India Express’ chief executive officer (CEO), Aloke Singh, announced that the airline will reduce its flight operation in the coming days.
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“Since last evening, over a 100 of our cabin crew colleagues have reported sick prior to their rostered flight duty, at the last minute, severely disrupting our operations. Because this action was mostly by colleagues assigned L1 role, the impact was disproportionate, disrupting 90+ flights even though other colleagues reported for duty,” the airline’s CEO said in a statement.
He further added, “the disruptions have cascaded across the network, forcing us to curtail the schedules over the next few days. We had to do this to cope with the non-availability of crew and to recover schedules.”
He also emphasized that this behaviour does not represent the majority of the airline’s cabin crew, who remain dedicated to their service.
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“This act is certainly not representative of the 2,000-odd cabin crew colleagues in the company who continue to respond to the call of duty and serve our guests with dedication and pride. I am thankful to all who are standing by the airline in this hour of crisis,” he said.
He also called the staff for discussions regarding any concerns that need to be addressed and saying that all communication channels are open.
These delays and cancellation of flights of Air India Express has raised concerns within the Ministry of Civil Aviation, prompting the ministry to call for a detailed report from the airline regarding the same.
The ministry has also urged the airline to promptly resolve the issues. Additionally, Air India Express has been advised to ensure that facilities are provided to passengers as per the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) norm.
