Despite crunch, Airport Authority has filled less than half of CNS posts

New Delhi: Faced with acute shortage of Communication, Navigation and Surveillance (CNS) personnel, the Airports Authority of India (AAI) is yet to fill half of the advertised posts so far, which is claimed to have affected day-to-day functioning.
“After two-years of starting the recruitment process for manager (electronics) in CNS, AAI shortlisted only 87 candidates on the basis of an open exam and interview against the total vacancies of 171,” said S Kobiraj, general secretary CNS Officers Guild (CNSOG).
CNS personnel look after the sensitive radar, communication and other navigational systems of the Air Traffic Services.
“The state-of-affairs could be judged by the fact that an advertisement for recruitment of CNS executives, manager (electronics), was published in October 2007 and written test conducted after a year in November 2008,” he said.
The results were declared in June 2009 and interviews held in August. The final result was declared last month but only 87 candidates were shortlisted against the 171 posts as advertised, Kobiraj said.
However, AAI sources said rest of the posts could not be filled up due to “lack of availability of right kind of people”.
At Hyderabad airport, there were 55 CNS people as against the sanctioned strength of 110, while at IGI airport, which is country’s busiest airport, there were only 110 personnel as against the required 140.
A similar situation faces Air Traffic Controllers also. The AAI had invited applications for 68 posts of Manager (ATC) in 2007, following which written tests were held in November 2008. The results of 68 successful candidates were declared in December 2009 and displayed on the AAI website.
But surprisingly, the results of 33 candidates were withdrawn this February with the final list showing only 35 successful candidates. No reason was cited for this.
28/03/10 PTI/Daily News & Analysis