Air India Sheds Weight by Grounding Dozens of Obese Cabin Crew

New Delhi (Sputnik) — India's state-run carrier Air India has grounded 57 cabin crew members, mostly air hostesses, for being overweight. This means a massive cut in their monthly allowances. Air India Cabin crew get a flying allowance that ranges from anything between US$ 500 and US$ 1,000 a month.

Those falling in the overweight category have been given three-months and those belonging to the obese category have been given six months to shed the extra pounds or else be permanently assigned ground tasks. Earlier, dozens of cabin crew members were given a deadline to lose weight while continuing to fly with an 'temporarily unfit' tag. But most of them failed to reduce weight to meet the required BMI. If they fail to meet the fresh deadline, they will be deemed 'permanently unfit', sources told Sputnik.

Aviation regulations states that the acceptable Body Mass Index (BMI) for a male cabin crew is between 18 and 25, whereas for a female, it is 18 – 22. An overweight BMI is between 25-29 for male and 22-27 for women. Anyone having BMI beyond the overweight figure is considered obese.

This is not the first time the airline has sacked or grounded cabin crew members over weight issues. When the initial proposal was announced in 2014, as many as 600 cabin crew members, both male and female, were found unfit for flying and asked to lose weight. But the obsess staffers failed to adhere to the norms.

In 2015, the Air India's medical services department had written to the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), urging it to tweak BMI norms as it would help airline retain some of its cabin crew, who are slightly above the permissible limits. The DGCA, however, refused to budge. The government, meanwhile, insisted that this was not a case of body-shaming.

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