Fly Bye

India opened up its skies to private carriers just as Western and U.S. airlines were in decline following 9/11 and went on a recruitment binge for foreign pilots to fly their newly acquired planes.

The 800 foreign pilots in Indian airlines, almost a fifth of the country’s pilot corps, are the most experienced — and the most expensive. So Indian airlines, which lost over $1.5 billion during the last fiscal year ending March 30, with encouragement from the government, are purging their ranks of foreign pilots. The government has mandated that Indian airlines phase out all foreign pilots by July 2010. In addition, Jet Airways recently sacked all 120 foreign air hostesses from its crew in a cost saving move.

In recent months, even immigrant friendly countries, such as Malaysia and Australia, have announced plans to scale back their reliance on foreign workers as they struggle with rising domestic unemployment rates.