Airports union threatens nationwide stir
10 Mar 2008
Mumbai: Airport operations across the country are likely to be affected from Wednesday as employees have threatened to launch an indefinite 'non-cooperation movement'.
The call was given by the Airport Authority Employees Joint Forum after talks on their demand to continue operations of existing airports in Bangalore and Hyderabad with civil aviation secretary Ashok Chawla failed.
The existing airports are to be closed down once the greenfield airports become operational. While the new Hyderabad airport is to be inaugurated on March 16, the Bangalore airport is expected to start in the next few weeks.
Under the contractual obligations with the builders of the new airports in the two cities, the existing airports have to be closed, civil aviation minister Praful Patel clarified.
He said the issue is not the new airports but the connectivity. He said it is for the concerned state governments to take interest in providing proper connectivity to new airports.
"We have decided to resume our agitational programme as the ministry is bent upon closing down the airports at Hyderabad and Bangalore,'' union leaders said.
The CPI(M) central committee also called upon the government to stop closure of the Hyderabad and Bangalore airports which are under the AAI.
CPI(M) general secretary Prakash Karat said a parliamentary standing committee had unanimously recommended that both the existing airports should continue to function due to the voluminous rise in traffic. The decision to close them down was taken because of the launch of the new private airports.
"Further, the AAI has already been weakened with privatisation of the Delhi and Mumbai airports. The closure of the Hyderabad and Bangalore airports will deal a mortal blow to the fortunes of the AAI, converting it into a loss-making enterprise," the CPI(M) leader said.
CITU leader and CPI(M) politbureau member M K Pandhe also shot off a letter to civil aviation minister Praful Patel saying closure of these airports would be an "unprecedented step" as major stakeholders, AAI employees and the management, had been "bypassed".
"The closure of a public sector unit or a part of it cannot be carried out without a specific cabinet decision for the simple reason that public assets created with people's money cannot be disposed off by an executive fiat through an agreement without a specific and a clear cut approval of the cabinet, if not of Parliament," he said.
