Air India’s woes are not just financial. It has been used by the political class to establish the latter’s ‘privileges’ in a blatant manner
The social discourse, like anything else, becomes painful when it is repetitive. Consider the case of Air India. The news has come of Cabinet approval of Air India disinvestment. Its form, character, proportion and more will need far more considered thought and many more resolutions on many fora. For several decades the entity has been in the talk of solutions for its endemic bankruptcy, indifferent management, terrible aviation purchase management decisions and more. Several of these were caused by factors outside the fold of the core Air India management. Many interventions have been attempted. Indeed, apparently, there is not a solution which has not been attempted or at least seriously considered.
The merger between Indian Airlines and Air India is a great example of experimentation in the governance domain. Persons such as Russi Modi were wheeled out of their ‘steel frame' to lead Indian Airlines; successful business leaders like Y Deveshwar were summoned from ITC to lead Air India. Favoured beauracrats were fielded by the dozen. The rest, as they say, is history.
One thing that did not change was the privileges of people in public domain, who, for years, have claimed priority on just about everything, big and small, with reference to Air India. This included preferential seating arrangements of the first two rows in all aircraft over the natural choice of a full revenue paying passenger, upgrades and more.
It set the operational priorities of the entity in question. Many are aware of the great drama which originated in Mumbai — about some VIP landing at the airport to discover that it was an aircraft which was all economy! So much for the onstitutional vision of a ‘socialist' India. Even outrage and anger seems to have become, convenient and selective.
Getting back to the theme of the discussion, namely, business propriety and organisational efficiency to make it worth the time for revenue efficiency, the story of Air India stays an instructive one. It has been stated that the repetition in public domain is painful, what's more it does not contribute to mitigating the loss of revenues in the business domain.
It may not be too much to argue that the guiding principles of Air India's operations have laid much emphasis on providing convenience to the powers-that-be in governance.
I recall a situation in mid-90s, where an Indian Airlines flight from Delhi to Patna was pushed ahed of schedule, from 7:30am to 6:30am of the following morning in the preceding evening at 11:30pm. (Of course this can be, technically justifiable) It seems even a media announcement on the radio and television was made somewhere around midnight. When more than half of the 07:30am passengers missed their flight, they were informed that the announcement about the changed schedule was made at midnight. If there were operational reasons for doing that, one could still understand. It turned out that two VIPs of the then ruling party had a programme in Patna which made it necessary for them to reach an hour earlier. Of course India Airlines obliged!
Getting into a debate on a topic such as this may not necessarily help unless it be realised that it is an outcome of an approach which belies any business or efficiency consideration. If there was not an Air India, the powerful entities of the day would not have attempted this kind of a behaviour. The proposition is simple: When the assumptions are flawed the conclusions are also flawed.
One can go on repeating the options for efficiency in a cyclical manner. One can even mistake movement for progress but really speaking correct diagnosis is needed for managing change. If Air India is to take to wings again, be it infusion of capital ; change in management; strong arm tactics; bringing in bureaucrats; bringing in people from the private sector or even disinvestment; the objectives are not very likely to be fully met, by this alone. Business must run as business.
A change of approach to aviation affairs, for Air India, in the real world, is needed. Convenience of the powerful shows, even when it is cloaked in the garb of the ‘people's' power represented by a select few, nurtured by an ingratiating set-up.
(The writer is a well-known management consultant)