For women pilots, sky is not the limit

Mumbai/New Delhi: Up in the air, Indian women are increasingly in charge. For a country that can’t ensure a woman’s safety or her basic rights on the ground, the recruitment record of India’s airlines presents a contrast. As a result, the next time you take a flight in India, the chances of the pilot being a woman are much higher than anywhere else in the world.

India currently has 5,100 pilots, of which 600, or 11.7%, are women, according to ministry of civil aviation data. There are a total 130,000 pilots in the world, of which 4,000, or about 3%, are women, according to the International Society of Women Airline Pilots.

“This is definitely one trend which flies in the face of global opinion of India as a regressive place for women,” said Harpreet Singh Dey, president of the Indian Women Pilots’ Association. She’s also the first female pilot to operate an international flight by a local carrier, Air India, in 1988.

Families are willing to back girls who want to pursue the profession even regardless of whether they’re married or not, she said.
06/07/15 Anirban Chowdhury/Times of India