Air India Express crisis: 5 flights cancelled in Kolkata; efforts on to get back to normalcy
Kolkata (PTI): Air India Express on Friday cancelled five flights on four routes from Kolkata as the airline is making efforts to get back to normalcy following the cabin crew-related crisis, an official said.
The airline cancelled two flights between Kolkata and Hyderabad, one each to Chennai, Cochin and Ayodhya, an Air India Express spokesperson told PTI.
These were among the total of 120 flights, both domestic and international, that were cancelled across the country on Friday, even after the section of the cabin crew who had been on strike since Tuesday night had called it off on Thursday.
According to the spokesperson, besides the 120 cancellations, the airline operated 246 flights to various destinations of which 20 flights were operated by Air India and two by Vistara.
Sources in the airline said though the cabin crew started reporting back to work, putting them on flights was not possible immediately due to a lot of technicalities related to rostering and re-rostering.
Things are expected to be fully normal in one-and-a-half days.
Sources also said that some time will also be consumed in the medical check-up of the cabin crew who reported back to work, besides working out the entire duty roster.
Notably, the strike (sudden mass sick leave) by a section of the cabin crew since Tuesday night had resulted in cancellation of more than 170 flights was called off on Thursday evening.
The airline also had withdrawn the termination letters issued to 25 striking cabin crew.
The cabin crew had started reporting sick to protest against alleged mismanagement at the airline.
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RS Chairman accepts merger of 7 AAP MPs with BJP
New Delhi (PTI): Rajya Sabha Chairman C P Radhakrishnan on Monday officially accepted the merger of seven Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MPs with the BJP, reducing the strength of Arvind Kejriwal's party in the Upper House to three.
After this transition, the BJP's strength in the Upper House has increased to 113.
Raghav Chadha, Ashok Mittal, Harbhajan Singh, Sandeep Pathak, Vikramjit Sahney, Swati Maliwal, and Rajinder Gupta are the seven MPs who have merged.
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The Rajya Sabha website now shows that the seven MPs are part of the BJP list of members.
The seven MPs had on Friday petitioned the Rajya Sabha Chairman to be treated as BJP MPs after the merger and the same has been accepted, sources said.
The AAP had on Sunday moved a petition before the RS Chairman seeking the termination of the membership of the seven MPs, who had switched sides.
Aam Aadmi Party MP Sanjay Singh said he has submitted a petition to Chairman Radhakrishnan seeking the disqualification of the seven party MPs in the Upper House, who recently quit the AAP and announced their merger with the BJP.
On Friday last, the AAP suffered a jolt when the seven Rajya Sabha MPs quit and announced merger with the BJP, alleging that the Kejriwal-led party had strayed from its principles, values and core morals.
