Aviation watchdog DGCA plans to bring gender parity in body-weight norms for flight attendants, according to a senior government official.

“The permissible body mass index (BMI) for female cabin crew is discriminatory. The rule for them is far more stringent than their male counterparts and we intend to rectify that. However, we have found that there is no such discrimination among male and female pilots,” the senior DGCA official told reporters on the sidelines of an event on Wednesday. The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has made public a draft amendment to a Civil Aviation Requirement, which revises the BMI for female flight attendants. It has sought comments from stakeholders on it until December 26.

As per existing DGCA guidelines, the maximum BMI for female cabin crew is 22 while for male it is 25. This has often resulted in more women flight attendants being grounded for being overweight than their male colleagues.

According to Minister of State for Civil Aviation Jayant Sinha in Lok Sabha last year, there were as many 30 female flight attendants of Air India who were grounded for being obese, while only four male flight attendants of the airline had been temporarily barred from flying duties.