Who will give justice to Engineers retired from Air India?

More than thousands of well qualified and well experienced Engineers in the category of Aircraft Engineers, Electrical Engineers, Mechanical Engineers, Civil Engineers, Architects from various Engineering / Technical Departments, like Engineering Department, Ground Handling Department, Operations Department and Properties & Facilities Department of AIR INDIA, have retired from long service with Air India since 1997 leaving behind their very big chunk of money in the form of “Arrears”, due from Wage increase effective January 1997. These Engineers, served Air India for more than 30 years bringing the Indian Flag Carrier “AIR INDIA” at par with the other topmost International airlines in the world and they retired without any ray of hopes to receive their hard earned money of life time in the form of “Arrears” as there is no “Godfather” for these Retired Engineers who can help them to get their money back from Air India Management after retirement.
The wage negotiations between “Air India Management” and the “Air India Engineers Association” (AIEA) did not take place for long time since January 1997. It took almost ten years for Air India Management to settle the revised wages of Engineers in the year 2007. In spite of the wage negotiations and settlement took place as per Memorandum Of Understanding (MOU) in the year 2007, the Management of Air India is still taking its own time and delaying the genuine dues of the retired Engineers for indefinite period. The Engineers retired from Air India have now entered in the age group of Senior Citizens and some of them have even crossed the age of 70 years after retirement at the age of 58 years.
The post-retirement Dreams of these retired Engineers have been shattered due to indefinite delay and non payment of their genuine dues by the Management of Air India. This was not enough, the Air India Pension Scheme for retired Employees was also flopped, for the reasons known to the Air India Management only. Hence there is no payment of Pension also for these retired Engineers. Further the Civil Aviation Ministry of Government of India decided to amalgamate the two airlines, AIR INDIA and INDIAN AIRLINES before settling the dues of Engineers retired from Air India. Thereafter the matter of payment of “Arrears” to the retired Engineers, went in Doldrums.
Surprisingly, at the same time, the Management of Air India was kind enough to settle the wage increase of all Officers of non-Technical category attached to “Officers Association of Air India” and employees attached to “Air India Guild” and paid full arrears to all Blue Eyed employees, (working as well as retired employees) of non-Technical category of Officers Association of Air India and employees attached to Air India Employees Guild. Also the Engineers presently in Service and all other Employees who took Voluntary Retirement have been paid Arrears. By doing this, the Air India Management has given step-motherly treatment and shown discrepancy to the retired Engineers from Engineering / Technical Departments.
Now who is to be blamed for this Agony of Engineers retired from Engineering / Technical Departments of Air India? Does Management of Air India or concerned Ministry has answer to this long pending issue? Or whether the Management of this one time “TATA Airlines” converted in to “AIR INDIA International Airlines”, wishes to bid “TATA GOOD-BYE” to these retired Engineers of Air India by not paying their genuine Dues? Or the concerned authorities are waiting till death of these retired Engineers so that the matter ends there.
06/05/10 PRESS RELEASE/Air India's Retired Engineers Blog

To Read the News in full at Source, Click the Headline

Categories: NACIL May 2010