Kingfisher suspends flights to some more cities

New Delhi, March 27:

Kingfisher Airlines has asked most of its staff members "to stay home" in cities around the country to which it has "temporarily suspended" flights.

The airline which used to operate to about 60 destinations now flies to less than 30 cities. Kolkata, Hyderabad, Patna, Lucknow, Thiruvananthapuram and Bhubaneshwar are among the cities to which the airline has "temporarily suspended" operations.

The airline's management has said that since Kingfisher "could resume" operations after getting re-capitalised, most staff members will remain on the company's rolls despite staying at home in cities to which flights have been suspended. The airline now operates about 120 daily flights down from more than the 400 flights that it operated earlier.

The airline, however, failed to quell speculations that it is planning to go in for large scale staff retrenchment. In a statement it merely said that it is in a "holding pattern" and is waiting for various decisions from the Government, the consortium of bankers on foreign direct investment and working capital funding among others.

"All of these will have a major impact on the staffing decisions we will have to make," the airline said in a statement. Kingfisher has not given the number of cities to which it has curtailed operations or the number of employees it has asked to stay home. The cash-strapped airline has about 5,400 employees.

"Staff members are being asked not to report for duty the day after a flight has reached. They are just told that there will be no operations from the next day," a disgruntled employee said.

Kingfisher has said that in the holding plan "adequate care" has been taken to ensure that part of the airline's "core inter-metro schedule is retained, while connectivity is maintained to many cities where Kingfisher is the sole operator".

The statement adds that the airline has started its summer schedule operating about 120 daily flights with 20 dedicated aircraft.

Interestingly, the DGCA Web site shows that till April 10 this year, Kingfisher Airlines' international operations will only be a daily flight between Delhi and London. Earlier the airline used to operate to Hong Kong, Singapore, Dubai, Bangkok, Kathmandu, Colombo and Dhaka.

The airline, which has debt of about Rs 7,000 crore, has failed to pay its staff over the last couple of months. The airline reported a 75 per cent increase in its net loss at Rs 444 crore for the quarter ended December 2011.

SOURCE