Thread by @anexcommie

#AirIndia_flip_flop I had joined GIC,nascent,fresh out of college, a direct recruit those days was considered a good omen(!): I had to attend a conference in the Sultanate of Oman, and GIC had a great policy - cadre wise(😭)- I travelled by train from Delhi to Bombay from where I

had fly into Muscat; till such time travel by train was by 1st class(my first as an adult)- no bedroll and all that. Landed in Bombay and my cousin took me home and the rest of the day was spent listening to how I should be dressed and the do's and dont's in a flight by my

maternal uncle (by virtue of him being married to my aunt, a scientist with John Wyeth and a guy whom I disliked to his end - a bloody snob; I was dumped at Santacruz 3 hours before and honestly I knew nothing about flying ,the procedures , procotocols etc including immigration,

check-ins, baggage and related crap..one book shop selling - possibly catering to goras only - even today I'm rather stupified that almost shops inside any Indian airport caters first to goras and then bloody Indians. GIC had yet another stupid philosophy - they never understood

that a round trip ticket costed lesser than 2 single journey tickets onward and return: however the lesson I learnt was never carry voluminous papers in baggage, a single way ticket,was auto upgraded from Y to B. I found nothing exciting ,a little intimidated by the cabin crew

(the hostess was one helluva a sweet aunty),who have me 2 dry chapathis and a cuppa yoghurt as veg meal 😭; everything about them I found was annoying,and,I vowed never to fly again, thanks to the great innovative policy of the government was all employees of the government

should fly only AI(!!!); OK,much later such stupid moves were done away with but it didn't mean that the perception that AI was created to white skins and Indians were 2nd class citizens to them. The other side was next trip after 2 years (in any government - quasi government

service flying abroad for meetings/training was by rotation ,you being liked by your boss and his/her boss too. Your job description or the work one did doesn't matter. However this trip was to Singapore and related to insurance matters in the state; now that's a lovely phrase -

11 of us were sent to learn 'innovative' methods of insurance (non life) as practised in Singapore and on return to submit a report of our learning. I think I was the only stupid guy in the group who took that seriously, for on landing, apart from the group meeting for breakfast

(it was free), saw them again only the next day. The difference in the flight was, the crew was young, efficient and above all courteous. AI then and till they began to sink never had a genuine policy of putting passenger first ,and ,unless this time they make that their priority

First Tata or no Tata, AI may not live long . Ofcourse it was much later in life that I became a literal globe trotter and any travel across the globe I realised that there is so much to learn about airports/airlines/it's schedules and india still are far far away from under

standing how important domestic travel is, and how innovative they need to become,even today. More on this later.