After showing 101 striking pilots the door, Air India may allegedly decide to fire the remaining 300-odd pilots who fly on the international sector and have been reporting ‘sick’ for the past month. That report — the latest in a long list of many such stories casting our national carrier in a shockingly poor light — ought to be looked at as the last straw. Because if partly shutting down international operations, sacking pilots and hiring new ones isn’t the last straw, we shudder to think of what is.

The strike has, at this point, been on for over a month. The government says it’s over, of course, but we believe it’s over only when the carrier can resume normal operations. At the start of this month, losses had already touched Rs 330 crore — hardly the kind of figure any airline can write off, let alone one that has been struggling for a number of years.