The door slides open and cabin crew dressed in elegant uniforms step into a classroom designed like a Boeing 737. There are 40 of them. They will represent both the passengers and crew for their theory and practical classes at the Pailan Aviation Institute (PAI) in Salt Lake, Calcutta.

A one-year diploma course in airline hospitality management is offered at the institute to those have passed Class XII and are 17-25 years old. Apart from technical knowhow and the history of aviation, personality grooming, beauty and diet sessions, fashion designing, yoga and gym sessions, ticketing and time management, the basics of the tourism industry, customer service, and the basics of hotel management are also taught during the course. The fee is Rs 82,000.

Classes are held three days a week to enable students to concurrently pursue a college education. Passangts Heing, 19, from Darjeeling, is proud of her parents, who did not insist on graduation. “My father works in a bank and my mother is a schoolteacher. Both encouraged me to join the institute after I passed my higher secondary examinations. I want to fulfil my childhood dream of becoming an air hostess and support my parents as soon as I can,” she says.

Breaking barriers

Gone are the days when only upper class Calcutta women could become air hostesses. With the immense change in the skyscape today, the profession of cabin crew is within the reach of the middle class youth of the city and the suburbs and PAI has paved the way for non-conventional beauties to groom themselves into chic and elegant air hostesses and for young men to turn into smart and helpful flight stewards.

Kaushik Kundu, the young director, says, “Our motto is to reach out to youngsters. We want to groom them into confident and efficient workers. We assure them that the aviation industry is going to become one of the most important providers of jobs in the future and PAI plans to extend this opportunity to other service sector areas such as hotels and restaurants and tourism.”

“Our unique selling points are many. First, we aim to include the middle class, with our reasonably low course fee that can also be paid in instalments. Second, we offer special coaching to those who are not so fluent in English since it is the one and only language for communication in hospitality management. Our experience is that those with a Bengali medium background are fast and eager learners. And third, but not the least is that we personally assist in providing placement for our students.”

Growing confidently

Students praise the institute’s efforts to improve their abilities. Mehuli Roy, a PAI student who also studies at Bhairav Ganguly College, Calcutta, confirmed that around 30 per cent of PAI’s students live in the suburbs. She says that students from a Bengali medium background “develop speaking power” with ease. “Personally, I have learnt to use make-up and choose my outfits. We have also been taught English etiquette,” she says. The course at PAI has improved “communication skills and injected confidence in me,” said 21-year-old Proloy Pal of Belghoria, who has hardly completed three months of training. “I can feel the change in the attitude of my friends and neighbours.”

“We need not spend much on advertising. Our placement record and quality of training speaks for itself. References of students who have passed out are our best advertisements,” Kundu says. PAI will allow three more batches of students to study along with the existing four this year as it wants more college students, both men and women, to grab the opportunities that the aviation industry will offer in the next ten years.

Swati Ghosh

Vital Statistics

WHAT IS IT? It is a training institute for air hostesses and flight stewards.

WHO’s the boss? The Director is Kaushik Kundu.

WHAT IS offered? A one-year diploma course in airline hospitality management.

WHo is eligible to apply? Those who have passed Class XII and are 17-25 years old.

WHen waS IT started? In 2005.

WHere is it located?BD-6, Sector I, Salt Lake, Calcutta-700 064. Telephone: 2337-6964/6965