Jet faces big test in first brush with union trouble

New Delhi: For the first time in its 16-year history, Jet Airways (India) Ltd has found itself in a confrontation with unionized workers that analysts warn could potentially upset an ambitious restructuring plan and make it difficult for management to trim the airline’s 13,000-strong workforce in the future.
Jet, India’s largest airline by market value, has had an association of pilots called the Society for Welfare of Indian Pilots, or SWIP, to redress employee complaints since 1998, but unlike state-owned Air India, with 12 recognized unions swearing affiliations to political parties ranging from the right-wing Shiv Sena to the Left, it has never faced worker unrest or a strike threat.
On 24 August, Jet Airways management received a 14-day legal notice from the airline’s newly formed pilots’ grouping, National Aviators Guild, or NAG, that all member pilots would begin a strike starting 7 September unless the Mumbai-based carrier reinstated two sacked pilots.
NAG, registered on 24 July, claims 650 members. It says the two pilots were terminated from employment because they were instrumental in forming the union, the first pilots’ association at a private Indian airline, which has not been recognized by Jet Airways management. Jet Airways and its wholly owned subsidiary JetLite have a total of 1,069 pilots on their rolls.
31/08/09 Tarun Shukla/Livemint

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Categories: Jet Airways Aug 2009