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 Domestic air travellers will now be flown by a set of expatriate commander and co-pilot, but can they be served by foreign cabin crew as well? The Directorate-General of Civil Aviation(DGCA) is grappling with this issue ever since Kingfisher submitted a request for hiring airhostesses and stewards from abroad.
Among Indian carriers, Jet Airways and Air India are allowed to hire multi-cultural crew for this purpose as they fly abroad. While Kingfisher has also put in an application towards this end, the DGCA is yet to see any 'justification' in the airline's demand for giving its nod.
"We are still in a dialogue with the airline. Since Kingfisher is currently not flying abroad, it will have to justify its demand," said a senior DGCA offical. Among other things, cabin crews have to be fluent in local language to be able to guide passengers in an emergency. All this means that the permission for hiring foreign cabin crew may come only after the airlines gets the nod to go abroad.
On its part Kingfisher said talks were on with the authorities on the issue and they would not like to comment at this stage. "The basic idea is just to provide a world class experience on our flights,"on offical said.
Industry sources said Kingfisher could be trying to get some senior foreign cabin crew to train their Indian employees to provide a world class inflight service on the international flights it is hoping to begin soon.
Language could prove to be the biggest barrier for allowing foreign cabin crew on domestic flights. "Even on international flights only some cabin crew members are from the country of flight's origin or destination to ensure that passengers who don't know English don't face a problem. The 'expensive' foreign cabin crew may be deployed only in business class where passengers would be fluent in English," said an industry insider.
This is not the first time that Kingfisher CMD Vijay Mallya has come up with an idea for which the authorites here are not ready. He has been demanding that beer be allowed on domestic flights. Serving of liquor on domestic sector was banned some years ago, following some cases of drunk passengers creating a scene in flight. Aviation minister Praful Patel had some time ago said that the ministry could study this proposal but so far no decision has been taken.
This news is by Saurabh Sinha, Times of India.
Similarly, the government is getting new airports built in Bangalore and Hyderabad with the condition that old ones will be closed once they are ready. Kingfisher has been demanding that both airports be used as traffic is growing at a faster pace than was earlier envisaged.
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