Air India pilots, protesting management's moves to cut their salaries and allowances, today deferred their strike threat from November 24 by six days, even as the conciliation talks remained inconclusive.
After a six-hour long marathon meeting, Chief Labour Commissioner (CLC) S K Mukhopadhyay appealed to them to defer their strike call till the next round of negotiations on November 30 as the management sought more time to revert on their demands, which include implementation of a turnaround plan without a salary cut.
This was their second round of talks before the CLC after the first meeting on November 9.
"The second round of talks was unproductive as the management did not come with crystal clear solutions to our demands. They also asked for more time, and on the request of Chief Labour Commissioner, we have deferred our strike call till November 30," Captain Shailendra Singh, President of Indian Commercial Pilots Association (ICPA), told reporters.
Singh claimed that the talks failed as the management had come up with "ambiguous" proposals on their demands.
"The third round of conciliation talks would be held on November 30 and, if on that day management does not give us a positive response then we will go on strike from midnight," Singh said after the meeting.
Apart from Singh, ICPA General Secretary Capt R S Otaal was also present at the negotiations, while the management was represented by Executive Director (Industrial Relations) T R Ramachandran and Deputy General Manager (IR) Amrita Sharan.
The pilots during their last meeting had threatened that if the airline management failed to come up with "positive steps" for company's turnaround by today they would proceed on strike from November 24 as per the notice.
The pilots' association, on November 2, had written a letter to Air India Chairman and Managing Director Arvind Jadhav for payment of their salaries and incentives by November 10, failing which they would be forced to proceed on strike from November 24.
They had also demanded an inquiry into the alleged mismanagement of the airline, implementation of uniform rules for all the employees of erstwhile Indian Airlines and Air India and a turnaround plan from the management without any cut in the salaries of any employees.
Senior pilots of Air India had gone on a five-day stir in September protesting against the management's decision to slash their flying allowance and productivity-linked incentives by half. Following the agitation, the management withdrew their decision.
