13,989 pilots employed by 6 major domestic airlines: Govt

Mumbai: Six major domestic airlines have employed 13,989 pilots, with Air India and its low-cost arm, Air India Express, having 6,350 and 1,592 pilots respectively and IndiGo having 5,085 cockpit crew, Parliament was informed on Monday.

The number of pilots at Akasa is 466 and at SpiceJet, it is 385, Minister of State for Civil Aviation Murlidhar Mohol said in a written reply to a question in the Rajya Sabha.

The government-run Alliance Air has employed 111 pilots, he added.

The minister said the rate of employment among qualified pilots is dependent on market forces.

He said the rationale behind airlines hiring foreign pilots, inter alia, is the requirement of a specific type-rated pilot in light of fleet expansions and time-bound operational requirements.

Mohol also said the flying training organisations (FTOs) are continuously upgrading their aircraft fleet by regularly inducting training aircraft fleets.

The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has facilitated the induction of 61 training aircraft by FTOs till November, he said, adding that the civil aviation regulator has approved two FTOs in 2025.

As of November 2025, India has 40 FTOs operating across 62 bases, Mohol said.

He said the modernisation of flying-training infrastructure is market dependent and undertaken on the basis of the commercial consideration of the FTOs, adding that the civil aviation ministry currently has no intervention in the same.

“However, India being an ICAO member, DGCA aligns its training and regulatory framework to ICAO’s Standards and Recommended Practices (SARPs). DGCA regularly assesses the quality and adequacy of flying training through robust regulatory framework,” Mohol said.

A continued review of safety standards is undertaken during the surveillance of these FTOs, in accordance with the published Annual Surveillance Plan of the DGCA, the minister said. Special safety audits and spot checks are also carried out as and when needed, he added.