Jet recalls executives, Sahara flies on its own

A day after the collapse of Jet Airways' agreement to acquire Air Sahara, both airlines began operating on their own today, rolling back the partial integration that had taken place since the signing of the deal on January 19 this year.

The management control of Air Sahara, which to a great extent had gone into Jet's hands, was restored to Subroto Roy's Sahara Group.

Air Sahara executives said the airline had written to the Directorate General of Civil Aviation, saying that its agreement to lease a wide-bodied plane to Jet be cancelled. Jet had deployed the aircraft for its international operations.

Agency reports said Air Sahara today filed a caveat before the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court, pleading that the company be heard before any order was passed on the dispute over transfer of management control to Jet.

According to PTI, the home ministry has cleared Jet Chairman Naresh Goyal's appointment to the board of Air Sahara.

Many of Air Sahara's flights were delayed by two-three hours and its engineering service disrupted today. Airport sources said this was the result of Jet withdrawing its executives "" including vice-president (marketing) Gaurang Shetty and chief operating officer Dale Moss "" and engineers.

However, Air Sahara President Alok Sharma said the reasons for the delay were routine. "The Air Sahara team has taken full charge of operations and is capable of running them smoothly," he said.

Jet Airways ended common ticket sales, passenger exchange, flight-swapping and corporate and agency agreements with Air Sahara.

Sources said Jet Airways had also dropped maintenance-checks for Air Sahara's CRJ and Boeing 737 aircraft. It was also on the verge of terminating the vendor support arrangement for supply of spare parts.

Jet's Thomas Kuhn, who was heading the engineering and maintenance wing of Air Sahara, and Poh Leong Choo, head of customer services and in-flight service departments, have been recalled.