AI's aircraft-to-employee ratio not ‘very high'

The aircraft-to-employee ratio in Air India (AI) is comparable to any world class airline, the state-owned airline has told a Parliamentary Committee.
Pointing out that there is no international benchmarking for an ideal aircraft-to-employee ratio, the airline informed the Parliamentary Committee on Public Undertakings that the employee-to-aircraft ratio on May 31 last year was 214.
The Committee was informed that British Airways had an aircraft-to-employee ratio of 178, Air Lanka of 434, Air France of 245, Egypt of 568, Pakistan International Airlines of 380, KLM of 220, Thai Airways of 321, Singapore of 161, Malaysian Airlines of 230 and Virgin Atlantic of 282.
The airline told the Committee that the aircraft-to-employee ratio varied from airline to airline depending on the nature of functions performed in-house. Further, most of the international airlines have outsourced a majority of their functions which are still being performed in-house by Air India.
“Concluding therefore, that the aircraft/employee ratio of National Aviation Company of India (NACIL) is extremely high may not be correct as foreign airlines invariably do not perform functions such as aircraft major maintenance activities, ground handling activities, vigilance, transport, medical, civil engineering, ministry references/parliament questions, among others, nor do they maintain departments such as Rajbhasha, internal audits,” the airline told the Committee.
29/03/10 Ashwini Phadnis/Business Line

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Categories: NACIL Mar 2010