India’s government has revealed the extent of the country’s pilot shortage at its state-owned airlines and detailed measures it is taking to address the problem caused by rapid growth. Civil aviation minister Praful Patel told parliament that flag carrier Air India is currently short of 118 pilots, while Alliance Air, a subsidiary of fellow state-owned carrier Indian Airlines, is short of 40 pilots. Patel says the government is “taking steps to overcome [the] shortage of pilots” and has changed the commercial pilot retirement age to 61 from 60 while reducing the total flying time required for the issue of a commercial pilot’s licence to 200h from 250h.
Source: Flight International
