Me, my family, my son-in-law: Pilots want a freebie parivar

New Delhi: What the striking Air India pilots don’t mention in their litany of complaints is how at a board meeting earlier this year they vehemently opposed any curbs on their royal privileges — “passages” or free return trip tickets for their family. And even refused to accept the private airline definition of “family”.
Unlike private airlines’ employees, who have restricted passages and specific definition of family to include only immediate members such as self, spouse, dependent children and parents, Air India’s definition is far more generous.
According to Air India, an employee’s family, entitled to travel free with him/her, includes: spouse, children, step-children, parents, brothers, sisters, sons-in-law, daughters-in-law and even grandchildren up to 12 years.
Even those who have retired are entitled to passages. “This has led to a situation where former Air India employees, currently employed with private airlines, avail passages on Air India,” said another executive.
In fact, freebies like passages are at the heart of the trouble fomenting at the airline, and one of the main reasons why the union decided to declare a strike. The matter was raised repeatedly at union leaders’ first meeting with Civil Aviation Minister Vayalar Ravi, soon after the strike notice in February.
In a proposal submitted to a Board committee looking into the harmonisation of pay and working conditions of erstwhile Indian Airlines and Air India, the only concession unions wanted to make was drop “grandchildren” from the definition of family.

Air India and erstwhile Indian Airlines follow separate policies on “passages”, entitlement to which depends on factors like rank and years in service. Over and above this privilege, employees are also entitled to “discounted passages”, where discounts may vary from 50 per cent to 90 per cent for family.
01/05/11 ExpressIndia

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Categories: Air India May 2011