Air India operations GM removed from post

Civil aviation minister Ajit Singh on Wednesday asked the Air India management to remove its General Manager, Operations, HY Samant from the post for his failure to put a crew in place for a Mumbai-Singapore flight on January 1.

Civil aviation minister Ajit Singh on Wednesday asked the Air India management to remove its General Manager, Operations, HY Samant from the post for his failure to put a crew in place for a Mumbai-Singapore flight on January 1.

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The Mumbai-Singapore A-330 flight did not take off Jan 1 mid-night because of non-availability of the crew. On preliminary enquiry, it was found that Capt. RS Dhillon was supposed to fly the said flight.

However, because of his suspension on December 31, 2012 for irregularities regarding fudging of records of simulator training, he became ineligible to fly.

This information was available with Samant who was in-charge of scheduling. However, he made no alternative arrangement for crew and as a result the flight had to be cancelled, putting 220 passengers at great inconvenience.

The minister found this a gross dereliction of duty by Samant and asked the airline management to immediately remove him from the post, said an official release.

The minister also ordered an inquiry into the incident.