The civil aviation ministry has termed the imminent strike by the employees of Air India (AI) on March 18 "illegal."The Joint Action Committee (JAC), which comprises eight employee unions including Indian Airlines Commercial Pilots Association (ICPA) and All India Aircraft Engineers Association (AIAEA), had given a notice to National Aviation Company of India (NACIL) that around 17,000 employees would be going on a countrywide strike from March 18 protesting against the closure of the existing Hyderabad and Bangalore airports and pending wage arrears.There was a conciliatory meeting of the union members with the Labour Commissioner. The next meeting with the commissioner will be held on March 17. "Since the matter is now with the Labour Commissioner, a strike by the unions will be completely illegal," said an Air India executive."After the privastisation of airports, groundhandling will be done by private agents and several people might lose their jobs. Also, we still have arrears worth Rs 250 crone to be paid to around 4,000 employees," said a member of Joint Action Committee (JAC). "We had sent a notice on March 4, 14 days before the strike and the meeting was only held day before yesterday. How can our strike be illegal? The strike is definitely on from March 18," he added.
