Air India comes back home to the Tatas

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jis

jis

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https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Transportation/Air-India-goes-back-to-Tatas
The Government of India has now divested Air India 100% by selling it back to the Tatas who were the original creators of Air India. The Government had nationalized it in 1953 though for quite a while after that they kept JRD Tata on as the Chief. It was finally during the first Indira Gandhi regime that Tata was let go, and Air India's spectacular downward slide began under the gentle care of the the Babus (bureaucracy) in Delhi. It then hit the bottom when the government forced a merger between Air India and its even more spectacularly worse performing Indian Airlines. Now the government pretty much has shed its illusions of running an international airline. It still retains the Alliance Air segment of the old Air India Group, which provides essential air service to commercially non-viable short routes. That part has never had any pretense or plan or visions of becoming a profitable enterprise anyway.

So now we have to see how things go. Air India used to be a class act under JRD Tata before it came under the government's tender loving care. Tata's now own Air India Group + 51% of Vistara (with SQ owning the rest) + 83% of Air Asia India (with the Malaysian Air Asia Bhd owning the rest). It will be interesting to see how it shuffles all this as things evolve.
 
jis said:
https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Transportation/Air-India-goes-back-to-Tatas
The Government of India has now divested Air India 100% by selling it back to the Tatas who were the original creators of Air India. The Government had nationalized it in 1953 though for quite a while after that they kept JRD Tata on as the Chief. It was finally during the first Indira Gandhi regime that Tata was let go, and Air India's spectacular downward slide began under the gentle care of the the Babus (bureaucracy) in Delhi. It then hit the bottom when the government forced a merger between Air India and its even more spectacularly worse performing Indian Airlines. Now the government pretty much has shed its illusions of running an international airline. It still retains the Alliance Air segment of the old Air India Group, which provides essential air service to commercially non-viable short routes. That part has never had any pretense or plan or visions of becoming a profitable enterprise anyway.

So now we have to see how things go. Air India used to be a class act under JRD Tata before it came under the government's tender loving care. Tata's now own Air India Group + 51% of Vistara (with SQ owning the rest) + 83% of Air Asia India (with the Malaysian Air Asia Bhd owning the rest). It will be interesting to see how it shuffles all this as things evolve.
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Do you fly on them Domestically while visiting India, or do you use Trains?
 
Bob Dylan said:
Do you fly on them Domestically while visiting India, or do you use Trains?
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I haven't ridden an LD train in India in years now. Usually I fly Vistara or IndiGo, but occasionally I have done Air India too. I have short time in India when I go there and I prefer to spend as much time as possible with friends and relatives rather than futsing around trying to get to them. The only train travel I have done is when I can do so with some of my railfan friends, and those are usually on a Shatabdi type trip, out and back the same day.

See, the difference for me is, I am not a tourist in India. For similar reasons I have never stayed in a hotel in places like Kolkata. Why would I when I can spend time with family? Similarly in Delhi or Mumbai unless just short overnight (arrive 11pm to connect flights early next morning). Don't want to inconvenience friends when that happens.

In the upcoming trip to India in 2022 I will be doing Delhi to Kolkata by Vistara and Kolkata to Delhi by Air India. I will have access to premium lounge in Delhi for the 8 hour overnight (but daytime by my body clock) layover from United to Vistara. For the return trip the layover in Delhi is around 4 hours (overnight again 11pm to 3am) and same or similar lounges available. On the way out I will be using the excellent arrival lounge (ground-side) in the International terminal and on the way back the departure lounge (air-side). So far no other trips planned. At most there may be one or two same day trips out of Kolkata to somewhere.
 
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Dakota 400 said:
What has happened to Jet Airways? I flew on them from Chennai to New Delhi and New Delhi to Mumbai. Comfortable planes and good ground service; good service and good meals, even in Economy Class. The meals were certainly more ample and appealing than what Amtrak's Flex Meals have been.
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Jet Airways went bankrupt and ceased operations in 2019. In the recent past the bankruptcy proceedings have concluded and the bankruptcy court has approved a sale to the Kalrock-Jalan group, which is in the process of reclaiming all the remaining assets that are covered by the bankruptcy. The court has directed DGCA India to allocate slots and other services to the reconstituted Jet Airways so that service can resume in the 2022-23 financial year.

I used to fly Jet and the last time I flew them was in 2018. In 2019 I had transitioned to Vistara seeing that Jet Airways was on the verge of folding. In 2022 I will be doing my India domestic flights on Vistara and Air India, both essentially operated by the Tatas after the Air India transaction closes in December 2021.

After that India will be left with one nationalized airline - Alliance Air, which serves economically non-viable routes to tiny airports as an essential service. It used to be a subsidiary of Air India, but is being hived off as a separate airline in course of the divestiture of the Air India Group.
 
Dakota 400 said:
Thank you for the information. As I posted, I enjoyed my flights on them as well as my visit to India.
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Fortunately Vistara is actually better than Jet was (from personal experience having flown both), and of course Jet should be back in action within a year from now too.
 
Is there any significant competition between rail and air in India, or are they essentially serving different markets and different demographics.

Could the air industry getting their act together be bad news for the railroads? Should we be concerned?
 
Most if not all Indian main line trains run at full passenger capacity, and one often finds they are fully reserved many weeks in advance. India is building new lines where none existed, as well as modernising and adding extra capacity by building freight only corridors. Trains are in huge demand in India.
I have never taken an internal flight in India, but my feeling is that although foreign tourists, buisness folk, and the Indian middle classes, an expanding demographic, will fly as a first choice, it is a drop in the ocean compared to the demand for economical train travel in India.
 
cirdan said:
Is there any significant competition between rail and air in India, or are they essentially serving different markets and different demographics.

Could the air industry getting their act together be bad news for the railroads? Should we be concerned?
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Only at the very top tier of rail accommodation. AC1 and to some extent AC2 compete with airlines. But even there the real issue is with upper tier losing to airlines on LD trains, not on day trains. The day trains generally have little problem with airlines skimming some from the top.

The thing is India is currently grossly undersupplied in capacity for both Air and Rail, so almost any additions to major routes get gobbled up almost instantly, except for the politically driven non-remunerative services, of which there are quite a few both on Rail and in Air.

Also remember, most of India actually travels in non AC 2nd Class Chair Cars and 3 Tier Sleepers, followed by AC Chair Cars and 3 Tier Sleepers. The fares are less than a quarter of anything that the airlines can vaguely dream of. There is absolutely no danger of that ridership disappearing into Air. The competition in short distance travel there is Bus, and there is none for LD travel, except a very small segment of luxury LD buses.

As for Air industry, the ULCC carriers are not the ones involved in the Tata consolidation. All three airlines involved do not pretend to or aspire to be ULCC, and Vistara explicitly advertises itself as a Premium Airline. It is yet to be seen what they make of Air India, but core Air India has never been an LCC either. It has had subsidiaries like Air India Express and others which have tried but failed to make a go against IndiGo and such.
 
My favorite item on Air India was we got real silverware, with a knife! After they took away my lighter (I don't smoke) and PS Leatherman (no blade) that are no problems in the USA...
 
Looks like Air India is on the verge of inking a large Airbus deal...



After many decades I might afterall switch back to Air India if the Tatas fix the service. My vest memories of flying Air India are from the Tat days back in the '60s, when it was a class act.
 

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