AirAsia, the new entrant in the Indian aviation sector, which has now been fully cleared by Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB), will start its recruitment process in Chennai from next week. In the first tranche, 50 flight attendants will be hired by the carrier that has chosen Chennai as its hub.
“We are expecting about 5,000 aspirants but we will hire 50 to start with for the India market and if there we find more worthy candidates we might recruit them for AirAsia’s international operations,” an AirAsia official told Express.
“Other hiring will follow soon. We are still waiting for clearances from the Ministry of Civil Aviation,” the official added. The FIPB has given a go ahead to the Tata Sons-Telestra Tradeplace AirAsia’s JV airline and also over-ruled aviation ministry’s proposal to allow foreign participation only in existing cash strapped carriers.
The Civil Aviation Ministry had earlier stated that FDI should be allowed only in cash starved Indian carriers and had stated that, “The policy should not just be followed in letter but in spirit too. The cabinet note which elaborated the background for the policy amendment had clearly pointed out that the amendment was aimed at infusing capital into the existing cash-starved aviation companies.
However the representative of the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP), the FDI policy making body, clarified that the foreign equity was allowed not only for existing airlines but greenfield ones too. “Wherever there was a distinction between greenfield and brownfield projects, the FDI policy specifically mentions like in the case of pharma or airports,” a DIPP representative pointed out. Thus AirAsia got FIPB clearance, overturning ministry’s plea of segregating between greenfield and brownfield projects for allowing FDI in airlines.
After getting FIPB’s nod last month, AirAsia has already started stimulating the market. It has opened bookings for two million seats offering tickets to South East Asian destinations for as little as `3,300 and is also offering free tickets (only taxes and surcharge needs to be paid) for travel within SE Asia. One can fly AirAsia from Kolkata to Bangkok for `3,300, Chennai to Bangkok for `3,500, Bangalore to Kuala Lumpur for `5,500, Kolkata to Kuala Lumpur for `5,000, Kochi or Chennai to Kuala Lumpur for ` 4,500 and from Tiruchy to Kuala Lumpur for `4,000 for travel during for four months of 2014. So by the time it launches its domestic carrier in India, many Indians would have tasted AirAsia’s service in international markets.