Sanjay Agarwal, Highest Paid CEO in the Airline Biz

According to Jitender Bhargava, former Executive Director, Air India, KFA was bound to collapse. "It followed a suicidal business model. Had it been the U.S., it would have completely grounded by now," he said. "No foreign airline can be expected to invest in a dying carrier like Kingfisher." Among Kingfisher's peers, the pay package of Spicejet chief Neil Raymond Mills rose even more sharply from 1.75 crore to 4.98 crore.

At Jet Airways, Saroj Datta, who stepped down as the company's executive director in September 2011, was paid Rs 2.11 crore in just six months of the last fiscal 2011-12 -- representing an increase of about 25 percent from his remuneration of 1.69 crore in the entire 2010-11. Jet's annual report for 2011-12 did not disclose any remuneration paid to its CEO Nikos Kardassis, while only Datta's pay package was mentioned among the executive directors.

Bankrupt KFA pulled in pilots from state-run Air India (domestic) offering salaries much higher than industry standards. "Both Air India (domestic) and Kingfisher have a common Airbus A-320 fleet. It was an advantage for Kingfisher to get experienced pilots who were groomed and trained for years at the best available infrastructure and resources at Air India. It was easier for Kingfisher to pay more and get them," Bhargava further said. However, ultimately the massive hikes in salaries contributed to KFA's collapse, he added. KFA's borrowings stood at 8,030 crore on March 31. The airline has defaulted on its payments to banks and its reported loss stood at 7,100 crore as on March 31.