Aviation: Summer schedule for Jet Airways flights approved only till April 25

The summer schedule Jet Airways flights has been approved by Indian aviation watchdog DGCA from March 31 to April 25, while the same for all other domestic airlines including Vistara, IndiGo, Air India and GoAir have been approved till October 26, said a PTI report, citing an official document. According to the international practice, DGCA approves two flight schedules in a year, namely, 'summer schedule' effective from Sunday of the last week of March and 'winter schedule' effective from Sunday of the last week of October. Notably, the summer schedule begins on March 31, 2019 for all the airlines. 

On Sunday, a major crisis at the crisis-hit Jet Airways was averted after its pilots' body, National Aviator's Guild (NAG), deferred till April 15 its call for halting operations. The NAG, which claims to represent around 1,100 of the 1,600 Jet Airways pilots, had announced earlier that its members will not fly from April 1, unless their salary dues were cleared and clarity was provided on future payments by March 31, PTI report said.

The NAG members took this decision at an open house meeting of NAG members which reportedly took place in both Mumbai and Delhi on Sunday afternoon. NAG president Karan Chopra told reporters after the meeting which lasted for about four hours.

PTI quoted Chopra as saying, "The management has shown us a positive intent by transferring our(December) salary and we thought we should give them at least a couple of weeks to settle down and form the interim board and solve our issues which they have already spoken about earlier.."

"Therefore, the collective call taken by the pilots in both Mumbai and Delhi of no flying, which was supposed to start from April 1, has now been deferred to April 15 in a hope that something positive pans out in two weeks," Chopra added.

On March 21, the NAG had requested the government to intervene for the survival of Jet Airways, after which State Bank of India (SBI) stated that the lenders will infuse interim funding of Rs 1,500 crore to sustain its operations for the next two months.

Earlier, Jet Airways' board had approved a resolution plan formulated by SBI-led domestic lenders. Under the plan, lenders reportedly decided to take control of the airline and make a fund infusion of Rs 1,500 crore.

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Notably, Jet Airways has been defaulting on salary payments to pilots, engineers and senior management since August 2018.