Air India: Losses keep pace with profligacy

New Delhi: With operational losses mounting to hundreds of thousand rupees a day, according to informed insiders, the merged Air India appears to be self destructing.
The non-stop Mumbai-New York-Mumbai service announced with much fanfare --- months ago has proved a failure. On most days, the flight does not have more than 50 paying passengers on board. The service is plagued by delayed take-offs and poor on-time performance. Contrast this with Jet Airways, says an airline source; in spite of flying via Brussels, the private airline operates near full services.
Air India and the former Indian Airlines continue to maintain huge personnel at stations such as Singapore, Dubai and Bangkok. In spite of this, ground handling at Dubai, for instance, is outsourced.
As many as 15 Executive Directors were transferred from Delhi to Mumbai following the merger. But not one of them has actually shifted residence, preferring instead to shuttle between the two cities, placing a huge burden on the airline's resources. Between 28 and 30 October, the airline decided to call its commercial staff from around the world for a brainstorming session in Mumbai. Each visiting sales head was allowed three minutes to make a presentation and many were too overawed, or too jet-lagged, to mouth little more than platitudes.
Senior staff are disillusioned, as much by the functioning of the airline as they are by Government attitude.
18/11/07 The Statesman

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Categories: Air India - International Nov 2007, Air india Budget Nov 2007, Air India Domestic Nov 2007, Air India Regional Nov 2007, NACIL Nov 2007