Kingfisher staff offered 3 instalments of dues

A fresh bid was made on Monday by Kingfisher Airlines to resolve the 23-day-old impasse with its employees on strike by offering upto three instalments of their salary dues before Diwali but the protesters insisted on a written assurance alleging that the management had earlier backtracked.

The offer was made to the employees representatives, who have been demanding payment of pending salary dues of at least four out of seven months before they resume work, held a meeting with management representatives at the Kingfisher House in Mumbai.

"There has been no written communication from the management in this regard.

"We don't know about any such offer," a pilot, who was part of the meeting, told PTI when asked whether the management had offered to clear two-three instalments of salary dues before Diwali in November.

"We cannot trust their words. They have gone back

on their verbal promises earlier. We need a clear-cut written assurance," he said.

Airline sources, however, said such an offer was made to the employees during the discussions on Monday.

The agitating staff have already planned to hold demonstrations and other protest actions, especially during the upcoming Formula One motor race in which UB Group chief and Kingfisher promoter Vijay Mallya is involved.

The meeting came in the backdrop of the airline losing its license to fly with aviation regulator DGCA suspending it last Friday, capping three weeks of lockout in the beleaguered carrier.

Ahead of the talks, a company spokesperson had said, "It is our endeavour to restart operations at the earliest and we assure you we are working towards achieving this.

"We have in any case always maintained that once the issues with the employees are resolved, we will first present our resumption plan to DGCA for review, before resuming operations," he had said.