400 Jet Airways pilots take immediate sick leave

Around 400 Jet Airways pilots went on sick leave late Monday night. The decision was taken at a meeting of the National Aviators Guild (NAG) — a recently formed Jet Airways pilots’ union. The decision would come as a setback to the private airline, especially since NAG had earlier in the day called off their proposed strike from midnight of September 7.

The reason the strike was called off was that the conciliation meeting with the management was still on, the NAG saying it was still pursuing talks with management to get two sacked pilots reinstated. Going ahead with the strike once the conciliatory procedure is on is illegal.

However, during the day itself, pilots who are part of the guild said they would go ahead and protest in different ways, like going on leave.

Jet has over 1,000 pilots, with 80% being Indians and the rest expats. About 650 of the Indian pilots are part of the newly formed NAG, which had called for an indefinite strike from the midnight of September 7.

“We have called off the strike, as it will be illegal to go ahead with it. But our pilots are saying that they will hamper the services of the airline in different ways,” an NAG representative said. Later on, after midnight, the representative confirmed that around 400 pilots had gone on sick leave.

The NAG is demanding the reinstatement of two pilots — senior commanders Sam Thomas and G Balaraman, general secretary and deputy general secretary of NAG — who, according to the guild, were terminated from services without any specific reason.
The two were dismissed soon after joining the National Aviators Guild, which had only then been recently registered.

The matter was referred to the labour commissioner who heard both the sides on August 31 and called them again on September 14.