Decision on Kingfisher’s new flight schedule Monday: DGCA

India’s aviation regulator Saturday said it will take a call on Vijay Mallya-led Kingfisher Airlines new flight schedule Monday (Feb 27).

“We will take a decision on the revised flight schedule plans by Monday,” E.K. Bharat Bhusan, director general civil aviation told IANS.

“We have to see what kind of schedule they can operate and safely operate because they have less number of aircraft now,” he said, responding to reports that the airline in its new schedule had informed the regulator that it will not operate to some major cities like Hyderabad.

The airline has been curtailing its flights since Feb 18, as cash crunch, exodus of pilots and operational troubles hit its operations leading it to cancel hundreds of daily services.

According to reports, the fresh schedule submitted by the airline on Feb 22 identified cities like Hyderabad, Thiruvananthapuram and Jaipur to where it will not operate.

The regulator had received the new schedule via an email Wednesday, a day after the airline was directed to give a realistic flight plan.

The regulator is inquiring into the large-scale cancellations and the fact that the airline failed to inform it of its revised flight schedules. The DGCA is also said to be screening the airlines’ operational aircraft to find their airworthiness and if financial constraints have in anyway compromised passenger safety.

The airline had earlier said that it will press within a week or two 16 more aircraft into service which will support its existing 28 operational aircraft.

The airlines’ latest trouble started Feb 18 when its employees in Kolkata went on a flash strike. The carrier, on the other hand, blames the seizure of its bank accounts by the Income Tax department as the main reason for flight plan curtailment.

Kingfisher has a debt of Rs.7,057.08 crore. The company’s net loss widened to Rs.444.26 crore for the quarter ended Dec 31, 2011, from Rs.253.69 crore in the October-December quarter in the last fiscal.