AAI pays 600 jobless staffers in Mumbai

There are 600 employees of the Airports Authority of India (AAI) in Mumbai who draw their pay with no work to do.

They were associated with Mumbai Airport prior to its privatisation three years earlier. When the airport was handed from AAI to Mumbai International Airports Ltd (MIAL), the private operator, there were 2,500 employees. MIAL was to give an offer to 60 per cent of them to join it; only 200 accepted.

AAI was to get the rest redeployed over the next three years. That period ended in May this year. Some employees opted for voluntary retirement. Some others were transferred to airports at Pune, Goa and Aurangabad. But 600 still remain. They report to the AAI in Mumbai and draw a salary, but have no work.

AAI authorities said the problem was pressure from a "regional political party", which has insisted those who don't wish to go out of Mumbai can't be removed against their will. However, they said, the process is on, and the size of the problem had gradually lessened, with time.

"The problem was really serious just before the Assembly elections in Maharashtra but things have improved a bit now. We are gradually shifting the employees, keeping in view the local sentiments," said a senior AAI official.

Another official said these employees, whose pay totals around Rs 1.5 crore (Rs 15 million) a month, can only be shifted to another airport.

AAI's profit in 2008-09 was Rs 687.2 crore (Rs 6.87 billion) on a revenue of Rs 4,185.9 crore (Rs 41.85 billion).