Jet Airways to lay off 600 employees

Mumbai, Oct 15 (IANS) A day after striking an alliance with Kingfisher Airlines, Jet Airways has decided to lay off 600 of its employees.

The airline would lay off employees from the cabin crew, pilots, ground staff, airport services and management departments, a source said.

'Most of them have been in the company for less than six months. The airline has couriered these letters late Tuesday night,' it said.

After the alliance, Jet Airways and Kingfisher Airlines have decided to code-share on domestic and international flights, undertake joint fuel management and common ground-handling services and cross-sell flights through the global ticketing system.

The Jet Airways spokesperson declined to comment on the lay offs.

This is the third time that the airline is cutting its workforce. After acquiring Air Sahara in 2007, the carrier had cut staff by 1,200 and in August 2008 JetLite offered a voluntary separation scheme to over 700 employees.

In September, Kingfisher Airlines had pruned 300 jobs, of which five percent were from Kingfisher Airlines, and the rest were from the erstwhile Simplify Deccan.

Kingfisher Airlines and jet Airways have a combined strength of around 19,000 employees with 189 aircraft for 927 domestic and 82 international flights.