Air traffic controllers (ATCOs) at some of the busiest airports in the country such as Delhi are unable to get their mandatory break of 30 minutes after every two hours because of manpower crunch, and at airports such as Guwahati, they work 365 days a year without a day off. The shortage of staff has also led to women employees being denied childcare leave.
The sanctioned strength of ATCOs in the country is 3,901, against which only 3,162 personnel are employed- a shortage of 19%. This gap is only getting wider. Those part of discussions within the Airports Authority of India (AAI) say that with several unused airports being revived under UDAN (or regional connectivity scheme) in tier-2 and tier-3 airports and development of new airports like Jewar and Bhogapuram, another estimated 300 to 500 ATCOs need to be hired immediately.
In order to deal with the shortage, ATCOs at many airports have to work extra hours. Last month, the AAI sought exemption from the DGCA (Directorate General of Civil Aviation), for the third time in the last one year, from implementing the mandatory shift timings that were to come into effect from November 5, 2020. These were a part of the reforms undertaken in licensing of the ATCOs after U.N. aviation watchdog International Civil Aviation Organisation's safety audit in 2018.
"The exemption has been granted for six months in view of the prevailing COVID-19 situation with safeguards and to maintain the availability [of personnel]," a senior DGCA official told The Hindu. Its last exemption expired on January 12, 2022.
Duty period
The DGCA's "watch duty time limitations" for ATC personnel require that a duty period should not exceed 12 hours. The total duty period should also not exceed 45 hours in six days and 200 hours in 30 days. When a person works on night duty, she or he must get 48 hours of rest. While on duty, the ATCOs should not work for more than two hours at a stretch, which should be followed with a 30-minute rest.
At Delhi, among the busiest airports in the country, the ATCOs don't get their mandatory 30-minute break after two hours during night duty. This break is given after four hours instead.
At several airports such as Guwahati, the ATCOs don't get their 48-hour rest period after their night shift, effectively leading them to work all-year round without a single day off, a member of the ATC guild said on the condition of anonymity. He noted that there were similar problems at airports like Ahmedabad , which did not have sufficient rated controllers. Overtime is also learnt to be a problem at airports like Jaipur, Calicut, Tiruchi and Kochi.
"With new airports coming up in the country, the time to hire is now, as onboarding them takes nearly 2 to 2.5 years. This includes written test, simulator training, on the job training," said a senior official who handles airport operations.
"We can't have uniform rules for the entire country. These should vary from one airport to another. Airports with less traffic such as Shimla may not have the same requirements as an airport like Delhi and Mumbai, where personnel are under immense stress because of higher number of flights every hour. The DGCA's rules must make these distinctions," said a senior government official who acknowledged that they had to make certain tweaks to shift timings to cope with shortage of staff.
‘No recruitment in 2 years’
Another official said the Delhi airport needed "significantly higher" number of ATC personnel. Today it has 385 ATCOs. It is learnt that while it was recommended that 300 ATC personnel need to be hired annually, no recruitment had taken place in the past two years.
The matter was raised by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on “Transport, Tourism and Culture that tabled the government’s action taken report and its recommendation on them on Wednesday.
In its response, the Ministry of Civil Aviation said that it was in the process of hiring 519 ATCOs and expected to complete the process by March 31, 2022. The panel expressed its “serious concern” that these vacancies should be filled up urgently. It had said that the huge vacancies of ATCOs “will adversely affect the work output by putting them under immense stress, thereby, compromising the safety of flight operations.”
This is also among the reasons the AAI is unable to provide childcare leave to its women ATCOs. The Ministry told the panel that a committee comprising the Chairman of AAI and all its Board members deliberated on the matter twice and decided that childcare leave can't be made available due to "operational exigency".
