Air India Pilots

Air India has its genesis when J R D Tata founded Tata Airlines in 1932. In the post World War II era it has become Air India, a plc. In post-independence era, Government of India purchased 49% stake; reserved its option to purchase additional 2%. It has become a national flag carrier and started international services under the name Air India International. In 1953, Government of India exercised its right for majority stake and nationalized air transportation in the country. At the same time, domestic operations were transferred to newly created Indian Airlines.

Students of the history of Air India and Indian Airlines will note two important aspects of this Organization(s), which is(are) Nation’s Pride. The first one, these two organs are routinely merged and de-merged, typically as a part of Strategic Management Initiatives taken by every new boss. It is the second learning that is most interesting.

The pilots of this national pride have created a unique patented culture of their own and it has become an accepted norm in our society. That is going on strike as frequently as practically feasible. The MTBS appears to be a shade less than 100 days. For the benefit of those uninitiated with civil airlines jargon, MTBS stands for Mean Time Between Strikes. In air force, this acronym has same expansion but means something else. This does not include the ones technically known as ‘flash strikes' which occur if any pilot drops his hat inadvertently anywhere between his house/5-star hotel and cockpit. Similary, mid-air strikes, runway strikes are also excluded for MTBS purposes. Each time they go on a strike, they routinely get a minimum monthly salary increase, which is about the full monthly salary of our beloved Prime Minister. They are high-flyers and they deserve hike for every take-off or landing us safely.

The management lesson here for all of us is, where MTBS is low, people and government do not raise their eyebrows and even get ready to meet the demands before they are made. Public does not react much as they are accustomed to that and already conditioned. Let us say a poor Postman goes on strike, not that it has ever happened in the long world history of Postal Service, entire 1.2 billion Indians will unanimously take up cudgels. The actual reason is MTBS is undefined as of now. Same thing happened in the case of IIT & IIM professors, as they did not study the techniques of our Pilots. There lies their fault.

PS: The rules of the game are different for private airline pilots; how can private sector pilots go on strike without paying royalty to Air India pilots?