Air India top recruits face Ravi’s audit

New Delhi: India’s new aviation minister wants to assess just how “beneficial” the expensive hires Air India has made in recent months have been.
Vayalar Ravi said he had asked the loss-making airline to give him, in the next fortnight, a report on the contribution of the controversial recruitments. His request came on Saturday, after a day-long review of the airline and its subsidiary Air India Express.
Last year, as it set about implementing a turnaround plan, Air India, which lost around Rs. 5,551 crore in 2009-10 alone, hired four top executives, Austrian Gustav Baldauf as chief operating officer (COO), Stefan Sukumar as chief of training, Pawan Arora as COO of Air India Express and Kamaljit Rattan as the public relations chief. The hires cost around Rs. 6-7 crore a year and came despite objections raised by some members of the airline’s board as reported by Mint on 29 September. In November, the board asked the airline to sack Arora, who still continues to serve as COO of Air India Express.
The Saturday review was attended by aviation secretary Nasim Zaidi, Air India’s chairman and managing director Arvind Jadhav, Baldauf and senior officials at the airline and the ministry.
Ravi asked the airline to “give me a report on their activities, what are they doing... just to make my own evaluation. I discussed their role (but have) not given any direction,” Ravi said.
09/02/11 Tarun Shukla/Live Mint

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Categories: Air India Budget Feb 2011, Air India Feb 2011