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- By Parinda News Bureau, February 02, 2006, 09:59 IST
Mumbai: Violence marked the indefinite strike against the privatisation of Mumbai and Delhi airports.
Scared that they will loose jobs because of the privatisation, over 350 officers and 3,500 Airports Authority of India employees manning the fire brigade (a key constituent in emergency preparedness), aerobridges, power supply, conveyor belts, communications, electrical and civil maintenance and housekeeping struck work.
However, with air-traffic control officials, contract labourers, CISF and airline employees-who do a host of jobs like check-in, security, baggage-handling and ground-handling duties-continuing to work, airline schedules remained unaffected for most of the day.
By evening, however, delays of 15-20 minutes started as flights to Bangalore, Delhi, Jaipur were rescheduled. The conveyor belts in the baggage-handling area of Mumbai airport stopped working because of the staff strike on Wednesday and loading of luggage was done manually, said a source.
The domestic airlines had sent out requests to passengers asking them to travel light and check flight schedules with airlines.
Although AAI officials said that a team from the Indian Air Force had arrived to man essential services like fire brigade operations, official confirmation was not available. The new director of AAI, R Treasuryvala, remained unreachable for comment throughout the day.
Earlier in the day, as passengers pushed their trolleys through the mob of protesters, flight schedule display boards showed that departures and arrivals were on time.
The protests brought out a rare display of unity among domestic airline operators who pooled in their resources to meet the manpower crunch.
Pilots had to wait for landing as remote parking bays were occupied faster due to aerobridges not being operational. The demand for stepladders rose, leading to minor delays.
Fears of the strike disrupting services came in the evening when at 6.20 pm, the power supply at domestic terminal 1B, the scene of activity, went off.
It was greeted with wild cheers from the 200-odd protesters who were on a blockade-demonstration outside the terminal. Within ten minutes, however, generators were switched on and the basic power supply was restored.
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