Sunday, June 18 2006 12:06 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: The Indian Air Force (IAF) says it cannot relieve every pilot who wants to quit service as this would impair its mandate to preserve national security.

Neither does it agree to the suggestion that pilots wanting to quit pay a lump-sum amount to cover the cost of their training because it was impossible to put a value to this.

All this in a scenario in which the IAF admits that it is short of about 250 pilots.

"If we do this (relieve every pilot who wishes to leave), national security will be impaired and that is not acceptable," the IAF chief, Air Chief Marshal S.P. Tyagi, told I sources in an interview.

"I have to answer this question to the people of India: Are we safe? I'd better make it safe because the taxpayer pays me to do this," he maintained.

Media reports some weeks ago said some 200 IAF pilots had put in requests to quit, citing harsh service conditions and fat pay cheques being offered by private airlines.

Tyagi had rubbished the report, saying the number was in single digit. He repeated this during the interview.

"The number of guys who have applied to be relieved is not large, so that doesn't worry me. But I suspect many of them have not applied because they know I will not relieve them. So I do not know which came first the chicken or the egg," he said.

"For me to say nobody wants to leave the air force would be wrong. The fact is that whenever there is a large differential between the market and government salaries, people will leave - be it from the civil services or from the armed forces," Tyagi said.

At the same time, he added that the government could never match market salaries and that the market 'will always pay more'.

Tyagi said it was impractical to even think of formulating a scheme under which pilots wanting to quit could repay the IAF for what it had spent on their training.

"I don't know how to calculate that money. Because when I train a fighter pilot to strike an army formation, huge numbers of tanks have been put out. Then I fly him in a formation. To train this guy I have to put three more aircraft in the air," he said. "So, how do I calculate the training cost? It is not simple mathematics of 200 hours multiplied by X number of pilots. It doesn't work like this.

"Then, if after all this training, supposing I accept the money. What do I do with it? I have relieved someone with five to 10 years of training. It will take me another five to 10 years to train another pilot," he said.

"Those are my difficulties. I want my boys to get more money but I don't know how to run the air force and get them Jet Airways salaries," Tyagi maintained.

He also pointed out that pilots joined the IAF with their eyes open and could not later complain of poor salaries or harsh service conditions.

"When you join the service, you join with open eyes. The contract is that you will serve till the president of India so desires," he said.

"You join at a particular salary, you join with these conditions have I broken that contract? No," he asserted.

"Parliament was informed last month that 246 IAF pilots opted for premature retirement during 2003-05 but they had "completed their useful tenure as pilots," he said.

Of these, 72 sought premature retirement in 2003, 116 in 2004 and 58 in 2005, Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee said in a written reply in the Lok Sabha.

The minister, however, evaded a direct reply to the question whether the government was aware that a large number of IAF pilots were seeking to quit the service to join private airlines.

"The requests for acceptance of premature retirement/resignation from the pilots are considered as per government instructions. The majority of pilots released from service have already completed their useful tenure as pilots," Mukherjee stated.

"These exits do not affect the operational status of the squadrons. The improvement in the job profile of the IAF pilots is a continuous phenomenon and is undertaken regularly," he added.