Best Airline in India
 

Hey folks!

Given the huge boom in aviation in India, I am curious to know where all the airlines stand in terms of employment/work conditions. Which are the best ones to work for and which are the worst...everything from passenger to cargo.

1.
2.
3.
4.
....etc...you get the idea.

Contribute away. Lets have a list beginning with the one(s) you know is/are the BEST TO WORK FOR AS A PILOT and work your way down to the worst.

Thanks
aero

So far Sahara has been pretty good. The pay is low but the equipment is good and the people are friendly.

Jet Airways & Kingfisher will emerge as market leaders in the next 2 years, both are good employers and good pay!

Without a doubt, the number 1 private Airline is Jet Airways .. also the most professional ...
cheers,

FT

- excellent service in the cabin too

GULL
 

In terms of being professional and pro pilot !

1 ) Jet Airways

2 ) Kingfisher

3) Indian Airlines

4 ) Air Deccan

5) Air Sahara

Dunno about the others cause no exposure there !!

:ok:

Tony Blair just did the sale of 43 airbus for IC, are they all A320? Will Alliance Air get some of them as well?

Where are the pilots to fly all these a/c. Where are the ATC's to controll them? What about Mx?

Heard Airbus will open a flt sim training center in BLR?

20 A319, 19 A321s and 4 A320s. Some of the A319s will go to Alliance Air whose 737-200 antiques will be finally retired from passenger traffic.

The Alliance 319s will mostly be basd in CCU. The 321s are likely to be spread equally between BOM and DEL and some to other stations like MAA ,BLR and HYD.

All powered by CFM powerplants.

Air India?
 

And as for Air India, how they are regarded?

beg to differ
 

my personal rating

1) Jet & Sahara (joint 1st)

2) Indian Airlines (good ol' beetlenut chewing/spitting babus)
you fly good/bad/or just drive the bus the way you like it, no one gives 2 hoots about it !!! joining salary is peanuts.

3) Spicejet (great pay, good hardworking bosses)
dynamic team heading a couple of good pilots. dont know how the new caps will fly. li'll iffy on how long they plan to keep it running though.

4) Kingfisher ( only ex IAF pilots dare go there)
pretty dames yes, but its the faujis (IAF pilots) who rule. dogs and civilians not allowed.

5) Deccan (true, low cost menace!)

6) Air India (welcome to the jungle!!)
earn money for wifee kids and future gens, while you waste away your life in aircraft bunks, and crew transport!

my rationale for Jet and Sahara joint 1st.....
Okay. jet is professional, organsied and has good plans for the future. but for a co pilot, the fastest way to the left seat is to be in sahara and work hard and get the ATPL and the company sends you to CAA for command training, and ready to fly P1. Sahara pilots know the limitations of the aircraft and dont try and stretch them, thats why except for the fatal 732 crash good 12 years back (during trg), they have a better incident record than jet airways. Jet pilots are considered "too hot to handle" cuz they take a bit "too much pride" in the training they recieve.
as for stability, anyone in india knows the cash coffers of the Sahara Group. so salary does arrive there on the 1st of every month.

a few foreigners roped in from United to set things straight in Sahara. and looks like they are beginning to look promising.

Sahara have a better incident record than jet airways.
********

Agreed , but then dont forget that may be except for the last couple of years, Jet's fleet strength and subsequently aircraft movements have been always 4 to 5 times more than Sahara. Even now I think the ratio is 50 vs 20 or something close to that! Towards the end of the 90s, Sahara was strugggling to have just abt 3 a/c (the bare minimum to retain scheduled status at that time!).

By the way what was the reason for the nose wheel collapse at GOI recently on that CRJ ferry flight?

We had about 15 pilots goto Spicejet and all came back. Have heard nothing good about Spice or AIE. Things are pretty good here at Sahara. Not the highest pay by any means but not the hardest job either. They brought in the VIP of flt. ops at United here so we shall see what happens.

Young_Turk, "CAA for command training" whats that ! any help mate?:confused: thks

"CAA Training"
 

Sahara has loads of p1/p2/CP/Instr training going on plus the recurrent training requirements, so all eligible p2s are being shipped to Luton, UK for "wet P1 training" programs with Alteon (ex FSBT). so wat you have is brit instructors from RyanAir/BA/Easyjet/Freelance chaps training Sahara pilots for command. New trend is that the check too is done by Brit Examiners (and try and impress the Stiff Upper Lips !!! its a tough task!) so in the end pilots learn little pointers from the CAA perspective as well, along with doing the good ol' DEEGEECEEAAAYE stuff.

Cant say its the right thing or wrong but it sure sorts out the training hassles for sahara right now.

Good replies! Keep 'em coming!

What about the corporate sector in India? Are they pretty stable in terms of maintaining an aviation department or are they losing a lot of their pilots to the airlines?

Cheers
aero

Other than TATA, Reliance & UB Group all the corp aircrafts are grounded, pilots have moved to airlines.

The pay scales very low in corp, a few good perks thats all. Cant say no to an A320 and a US$ 2000 hike in pay can you.

Hairy CHest, just curious I have a buddy thats taking a job flying a Hawker in Mumbai and I saw one flying out of Delhi. Are you saying they are really short as I saw the hawker flying a few days ago when I was taxiing in.

Ther are plenty of jobs in the corporate sector , heard that there are a few biz jets which need crew , and they are taking on expats.

Which one is WILLING to pay MARKET RATES for quality crew?
After all, they charge MARKET RATES for their
(i) tickets;
(ii) aircraft purchase/hire prices;
(iii) insurance;
(iv) fuel;
(v) management.

WHY do they think they can skimp on pilots' salaries??
:uhoh: ........maybe it's because of US!!

Suckers R' US !

Forgive me for not knowing, but how would one approach a corporate flight department in India regarding jobs for pilots. Airlines , for example, have addresses which you can send resumes to but what about TATA, the UB Group etc. Where and who do you send your resumes to....do you send it to the comapny's general mailing address? Maybe, even calling up the company to find out?....I wonder if the person answering the phone would even know if they had such a thing as a corporate flight department!

Anyway, thanks for the replies and information....very much appreciated.

aero