ISLAMABAD: The government has reportedly prepared a plan to make the Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) a profitable organization that envisages reduction in the size of employees from 500 to 250 per aircraft.

According to media reports attributed to PIA spokesman Abdullah Hafeez Khan, there are 14,500 employees for 29 aircrafts of PIA and restructuring plan prepared by the government in order to deal with the organization losses envisages 250 employees per aircraft instead of 500 per aircraft.

He further stated that 3500 employees would be offered volunteer retirement by December 2020 and based on performance, forced retirement scheme would be enforced with completion time period of January 2021.

Headquarter of PIA would be shifted to Islamabad under the restructuring plan and measures to this effect would be taken while Engineering Department airline would be shifted to Islamabad by June 2021, he added. The employees in all the departments would be reduced and free air tickets of employees would be decreased in order to bring the organization out of losses, he added. Fate of those employees against whom cases are in the national accountability would be decided soon, he said.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2020