Mumbai:

A recruitment drive for airport loaders led to a stampede-like situation in Mumbai yesterday. More than 25,000 applicants turned up for a shot at the 2,216 vacancies, and the staff of Air India Airport Services Limited struggled to manage the massive crowd. Air India Airport Services Limited provides ground handling services at major airports in India.

Visuals showed the applicants jostling with each other to reach the form counters. Reports said the applicants had to wait for hours without food and water, and many of them started feeling unwell.

Airport loaders are tasked with loading and unloading luggage on aircraft and operating baggage belts and ramp tractors. Each aircraft needs at least five loaders to handle luggage, cargo and food supplies.

The salary of airport loaders ranges between Rs 20,000 to Rs 25,000 a month, but most make over Rs 30,000 after overtime allowances. Educational criteria for the job are basic, but the candidate must be physically strong.

Among the aspirants is Prathameshwar from Buldhana district, who has travelled over 400 km for the interview. “I have come to apply for the post of handyman. They are offering a salary of Rs 22,500,” he said. Prathameshwar is a second year BBA student. Asked if he would quit his studies if he gets the job, he replied, “What do we do? There is so much unemployment. I urge the government to create more job opportunities.”

Another aspirant who has a BA degree said he does not know much about the work of a handyman, but says he “needs the job”. Another candidate has travelled from Rajasthan’s Alwar to Mumbai. He has an MCom degree, but has applied for a job that has a basic education requirement. “I am preparing for government job exams, someone told me that the salary here is good. So I came.”

The Mumbai incident comes days after a viral video showed hundreds of jobseekers pushing and shoving each other at a walk-in interview at Ankleshwar in Gujarat’s Bharuch district.

Nearly 1,800 aspirants had turned up for a recruitment drive for just 10 posts in a private firm. Such was the rush that a railing on the ramp leading to the office’s entry collapsed under the weight of the jobseekers. Fortunately, the ramp was not very high, and none of the aspirants who lost their balance after the railing collapsed suffered serious injuries.

Latching on to the video, the Congress said it “exposed the BJP’s Gujarat model” and said the ruling party was imposing this model of unemployment across the country.

Local BJP MP Mansukh Vasava blamed the private firm for the incident. “They were filling up only 10 vacancies and should have specified the criteria properly instead of holding an open interview. At some level, the incident occurred because of the company. We are worried about it and steps are being taken to ensure such incidents don’t happen again.”

The Mumbai video, too, has prompted Congress MP Varsha Gaikwad to raise the unemployment issue and target the BJP.

The Mumbai North Central MP said that the unemployment situation has become so bad in the past 10 years that youngsters are ready to fight wars for Russia and Israel. “Whenever they hear of jobs, they gather in thousands and there is a fear of stampede,” she said in a Hindi post on X.

Air India is yet to respond to the viral video.