NEW DELHI: Having to cancel over 150 flights in the first week of April due to non-availability of pilots, Vistara on Sunday said it is cancelling 10% of its daily flights in April as it looks to normalise operation.
“We are carefully scaling back our operations by around 25-30 flights per day. This will take us back to the same level of flight operations as at the end of February 2024, and provide the much-needed resilience and buffer in the rosters,” said a Vistara Spokesperson.
The cancellations are done mostly in the domestic network of Vistara, a joint venture between the Tata Group and Singapore International Airlines. Vistara operates about 300 flights daily and 1,000 pilots on its rolls. Earlier this week, the DGCA sought a daily report from the airline as the issue snowballed into a major embarrassment.
Vistara pilots were not happy with the revised salary structure, which is being “forced upon them” ahead of its merger with Air India, they said.
Vistara CEO Vinod Kannan, a day ago said that 98% of its pilots have signed the new contracts with the revised salary structure. “We are aware that some pilots have some concerns and queries regarding the contract. We are engaging with them to clarify and resolve the same. However, this has not caused any visible spike in attrition among the pilots,” Kannan said.