Our Bureau

New Delhi, Feb. 11 Air travel through out the country could be affected on February 12 with Airports Authority Employees Union (AAEU) planning to go on a relay hunger strike protesting against Government inaction on a number of issues including delay in grant of mini-ratna status to the Airports Authority of India and closure of existing airports at Bangalore and Hyderabad.

“The hunger strike is on. Our members at all the 126 airports around the country will go on a relay hunger strike. Domestic airline operations are likely to get affected but not international operations as the protest is to take place between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m.,” the General Secretary, AAEU, Mr M.K. Ghoshal, said late tonight after a meeting with the Chairman of Airports Authority of India, Mr K. Ramalingam.

The AAEU is also protesting the Government’s decision to hand over the Nagpur airport to the Maharashtra Government, the new ground handling policy apart from seeking greater clarity on the proposal to develop 35 non-metro airports.

Meanwhile, officials of the major airlines including Air India, Kingfisher Airlines and SpiceJet maintain that the relay hunger strike will not affect normal operations or cause any major disruption to services.

“It is only the back room staff that is going on strike and not the loaders and check-in staff. Therefore the impact on operations will be minimal,” an official said.

The Delhi airport, however, has drawn up a contingency plan to ensure that the airport operations were not affected and passengers not inconvenienced, a spokesman said without going into details of the plan.

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