The JetLite booking office at Birsa Munda Airport on Friday. Picture by Hardeep Singh

Ranchi, Oct. 31: JetLite’s decision to withdraw flights in this sector has dimmed hopes of the 25 airline employees in the capital.

Uncertainties over job security reign supreme in the absence of communication from the airline’s corporate office about their relocation. The situation has forced some of the employees to visit temples with prayers of desperation, seeking divine intervention.

“Today, we had the last of the flights from Ranchi to Delhi and Calcutta. We are yet to receive any official communication from our corporate office in Delhi about our relocation,” said Raja Chatterjee, the station manager of JetLite at Ranchi, who is facing the heat, too.

“The corporate office, we hope, will send us a message about our relocation in the next four-five days,” said Chatterjee.

Like him, the future of 11 other employees in the customer care department of the airline, besides 13 loaders, looks bleak.

While no decision about retrenchment of employees has been taken yet, there is no word on relocation as well.

“We have not yet decided to relocate employees. It is an administrative matter. It is possible that we may reintroduce flights in this sector,” said A.K. Sivanandan, the senior general manager of public relations, JetLite, over phone from Delhi.

For the 25 employees, everything changed the moment a sudden message from the JetLite corporate office dashed their Diwali joy. The message said that the services of the airline would be withdrawn from November 1. Ironically, all the employees had received Diwali bonus.

The employees expressed surprise over the decision as they felt the two aircraft — in Ranchi-Delhi and Ranchi-Calcutta sectors — were getting a good response.

“We have heard that these aircraft are to be engaged in other sectors, which made the management pull them out of Ranchi,” said an employee.

While several employees engaged in the customer care section are simple graduates, there are some MBAs and diploma holders in hospitality, travel and tourism, too.

“The aviation sector today is going through a very bad phase. We are praying that we tide over this phase and the corporate office in Mumbai does not take any drastic step, which would render us jobless,” said another employee.