The confederation of Trivandrum Airport Casual Workers Trade Unions has boycotted all ground handling operations at the Trivandrum International Airport on Wednesday and Thursday as a token protest against the "termination" of at least 120 casual staff.

The Confederation,a joint forum of all trade unions operating in Trivandrum International Airport, has jointly decided to protest against the "termination" of ground staff in airport employed with Air India SATS Airport Service Pvt Ltd.

"We are aggrieved to observe that the action taken by Air India SATS management on termination of workers will add to the trouble faced by workers and hence unacceptable to us. If SATS management is facing any crisis erupted due to pandemic COVID-19, they can approach the joint forum anytime and discuss the same and can settle the matter rather than terminating the workers," S Vijay Mohan, Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) Airport union President, told PTI.

He said the joint forum had even suggested salary cuts and shifts to reduce the burden on the company but they refused to accept and terminated at least 120 persons.

He also added that the joint trade union confederation will take legal action and approach the Regional Labour Commissioner Office (central).

The ground staff at the Airport handles the operation of flights, luggage shifting, cleaning the flight, filling the cargo, setting up of conveyor belts etc.

Since a consensus could not be reached, the protestors have announced that the boycott will be continued on Friday also.

Airport authorities said they have made temporary arrangements to handle the works during the protest.