Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], April 27 : Air India will appoint Sisira Kanta Dash as the chief technical officer (head of engineering) and this will come into effect from June this year, sources said.
Sisira Kanta Dash is currently the head of engineering at Vistara. According to sources, Dash will take over the post from Arun Kashyap, who is leaving Air India shortly after a year in pursuit of other opportunities.
The appointment of a senior executive from Vistara in Air India could also be a precursor to the merger of the two airlines which is pending regulatory approval.
On February 27, Air India Chief Executive Officer Campbell Wilson said that the integration of Air India and Vistara needs to go through a regulatory approval process.
He explained that there are three steps to that process, one is competition clearance, the second is the Directorate General of Civil Aviation's (DGCA) perspective and the third is obviously the merger of the two compes.
"We are in the process of the first phase seeking clearance from the Competition Commission of India but in anticipation of this we are working together with some external parties to work on what are the areas of opportunity in an integrated business, what are the things that we need to focus on in the process of that integration and what would the end State look like once we have received clearance to actually embark on the integration process," he said.
He added that the intention is to end up with one full-service airplane and one low-cost airline in the group.
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