The Hindu Business Line : Female in-flight supervisors to make debut on Air India

YET another male bastion is all set to crumble. Air India (AI), which so far had only male in-flight supervisors, will now allow female crew members to take up what till now was an exclusive male domain.

Official sources told Business Line that the order allowing female crew members to be considered for the post of in-flight supervisor was signed by the Chairman and Managing Director, Mr V. Thulasidas, late on Tuesday evening.

An in-flight supervisor is a person to whom all the crew of the aircraft report.

"From now on, not only will women crew members have parity with male colleagues in terms of their retirement age but executive women cabin crew members will also be considered for in-flight supervisors post," a senior airline official said.

Generally, cabin crew who have put in 25-30 years of service are considered for the post of in-flight supervisor. Indian Airlines already follows this system and has female in-flight supervisors.

Meanwhile, the arrival of a second wet-leased Boeing 747-400 aircraft on Wednesday will see the airline again offer shortly a daily Mumbai-London terminator flight.

The airline was forced to cancel some of the Mumbai-London terminator flights as the aircraft used to operate the service was used to operate Haj flights instead.

"The airline had originally planned to get two aircraft on wet lease to operate the Haj flights. However, at the last minute the wet lease for one of the aircraft fell through. The airline was left with no choice but to put another aircraft for Haj operations," said a senior airline official when asked why the London terminator flight was cancelled.

The first Boeing 747-400 aircraft that is being used to operate Haj flights arrived on December 5.