Warning bells rang one year ago

In fact, the Crisis Management Group CMG was told today that the Alliance Air subsidiary of IA was actually set up in 1995 for 8220;maximum utilization8221;of the 12 Boeing 20-year-old 737/200 aircraft which the company wanted to use for short-haul flights in 42 sectors. The jury is still out on whether IA passed on sub-standard aircraft to its sister company to operate on the non-mainline routes. Aviation experts say that although an old aircraft doesn8217;t necessarily mean an unsafe aircraft, for a company to operate only 20-year-old aircraft on 42 sectors is an extremely negligent policy to follow.

Finding itself stuck with these ancient aircraft and with its wage bill spiralling from Rs 100 crores to Rs 300 crores to an all-time high of Rs 900 crores in 1995, IA came up with the concept of a subsidiary airline where a contract system would operate.

Alliance Air flies between Lucknow and Patna, Agra to Khajurao, Imphal to Aizwal and also has some flights between Chennai to Bangalore and Delhi to Mumbai. Union Minister for Civil Aviation Sharad Yadav, at the meeting of the CMG, asked senior officials present why these old aircraft were still being used. He was told that the aircraft would have stopped flying next year and were only being used since Directorate General of Civil Aviation guidelines permitted them to fly. Yadav told The Indian Express: 8220;When I come back from Patna, I will take a look into this. How are they flying only 20-year-old aircraft?8221;.

Yadav8217;s shock is not surprising but despite IA repeatedly asking for fleet renewal, the government has been dragging its feet on giving the go-ahead. Instead, the Civil Aviation Ministry has been putting pressure on IA to buy 50-seater aircraft to operate in the north-east. Baijal had been resisting this saying that the aging IA fleet had put the airlines in a precarious position and fleet renewal was a priority.The recent agitation by the IA engineers have also added to Alliance Airways woes since maintenance of its aircraft is done by IA. The engineers have been on a go-slow demanding a wage revision for the past two months. Said a senior IA official: 8220;since they maintain our aircraft which obviously need more care one can only hope that the crash is not a result of faulty maintenance.8221;