Kingfisher may fly again from month end

New Delhi, Oct. 31: 

Has Kingfisher Airlines pushed forward its plans to restart operations to the end of November?

While officials declined to comment on the issue, Kingfisher sources claim the airline booking system has cancelled all flights till November 26.

Before the Directorate General of Civil Aviation suspended the airline’s licence on October 20, Kingfisher had announced that it would start taking bookings from November 6.

In effect, what the latest development means is that the airline booking system is not taking any bookings from passengers who might want to book flights from November 6 onward.

The airline declared a lock-out on October 1, after engineers refused to certify the aircraft, a requirement before any flight can depart. The engineers, like other employees, were protesting non-payment of salaries for seven months.

In an effort to end the impasse the company management paid March salaries recently. Furthermore, by late evening on Wednesday, the airline had started disbursing April salaries to its staff. The airline’s management has given its assurance that the May salary will be credited before Diwali, on November 13.

On Tuesday, the airline promoter Vijay Mallya met with K.N. Shrivastava, Secretary, Civil Aviation, in Delhi and said that Kingfisher was working on a revival plan.

At the meeting Mallya did not say from where funds for recapitalisation of the airline would come from or by when the airline will restart flights. The airline has been facing a severe financial crisis with banks together having an exposure of nearly Rs 7,000 crore in the airline. The airline used to operate over 400 flights a day to domestic and international destinations at the start of the year.

http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/industry-and-economy/logistics/kingfisher-may-fly-again-from-month-end/article4051458.ece