top of page

By:

Quaid Najmi

4 January 2025 at 3:26:24 pm

AI’s Maharaja smiles joyfully

All 30 grounded aircrafts now fly Mumbai : Air India’s Maharaja is all pleased as punch at 80. After years of huge costs and efforts, the last of the grounded 30 aircraft – inherited by the Tata Group during the privatization in Jan. 2022 – is now resurrected fully and took to the skies gracefully on Monday.   The aircraft is the gleaming VT-ALL, a Boeing 777-300ER, that was gathering grime since February 2020, and becomes the final among the two-and-half dozen aircraft that have been revved...

AI’s Maharaja smiles joyfully

All 30 grounded aircrafts now fly Mumbai : Air India’s Maharaja is all pleased as punch at 80. After years of huge costs and efforts, the last of the grounded 30 aircraft – inherited by the Tata Group during the privatization in Jan. 2022 – is now resurrected fully and took to the skies gracefully on Monday.   The aircraft is the gleaming VT-ALL, a Boeing 777-300ER, that was gathering grime since February 2020, and becomes the final among the two-and-half dozen aircraft that have been revved up and revived in the past few years, AI official sources said.   It marked a symbolic milestone for Air India itself - founded in 1932 by the legendary Bharat Ratna J. R. R. Tata - which once ruled the roost and was India’s pride in the global skies.   Once renowned for its royal service with the iconic Maharaja welcoming fliers on board, in 1953 it was taken over by the government of India. After years of piling losses, ageing aircraft, decline in operations and standards – almost like a Maharaja turning a pauper - it returned to the Tata Group four years ago.   This time it was not just the aircraft, the brand and the deflated Maharaja coming into the large-hearted Tata Group stables, but a formidable challenge to ensure that the airline could regain its old glory and glitter. Of the total around 190 aircraft in its fleet were 30 – or 15 pc – that had been grounded and neglected for years.   At that time, the late Ratan N. Tata had directed that all these valuable aircraft must be revived as far as possible and join the fleet. Accordingly, the VT-ALL, languishing at Nagpur for nearly five years, was ‘hospitalized’ at the Air India Engineering Service Ltd., its MRO facility in May 2025.   New Avatar Then started a thorough, painstaking nose-to-tail restoration of an unprecedented scale, in which over 3000 critical components were replaced, over 4,000 maintenance tasks executed, besides key structural upgrades like the longeron modification, engines, auxiliary power units, avionics, hydraulics, landing gears and almost every vital system was rebuilt or replaced.   After the repairs, the old aircraft was reborn, under the gaze of the Directorate General of Civil Aviation and technical assistance from Boeing, and the new ‘avatar’ jetliner emerged with the highest global safety standards.   The aircraft cleared all the rigorous checks, a successful test flight, earned the mandatory Airworthiness Review Certificate and then made its maiden commercial flight from Monday, March 16 – after a wait of six years.   Sturdy Fliers Created in 1946 to become an instant global icon, the Air India’s mascot Maharaja now sports a youthful and chic look, a welcome with folded hands, closed eyes, featuring a bejewelled turban, stylish jootis, and a textured kurta in Air India’s new colours. He is prominently visible at various touch-points in a flyer’s journey, such as First Class, exclusive lounges, and luxury products.   Today, he commands a mix fleet of around 190 narrow and wide-body Airbus and Boeing aircraft like : A319, A320, A320neo, A321, A321neo, A350-900 and B787-8, B787-9, B7770200LR, B-777-300ER. With the merger of Vistara and agreements signed for 10 A350 and 90 A320 aircraft, the Maharaja’s fleet is slated to soar to some 570 in the near future.

Creating in India, Thinking for the World

For WAVES to realise its promise, it must stop chasing the West and start shaping its own narrative.

Mumbai recently witnessed the inauguration of the World Audio Visual and Entertainment Summit (WAVES) on a grand scale, replete all the pomp and glory such an event deserves. WAVES symbolises an aspiration to elevate both Mumbai and India on the global entertainment map. Not just luminaries from across the entertainment industry, but politicians, industrialists and decision-makers converged for the occasion as they rubbed shoulders with Bollywood stars. Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself delivered the inaugural address, encapsulating the summit’s vision in the slogan: “Create in India, Create for the World.”


However, if the ambition is to build something truly grand in the future, it is worth pausing to reflect on how India has treated its illustrious past. Consider RK Studio in Mumbai. Founded in 1948, shortly after independence, it once stood as a symbol of Indian cinema’s golden era. Under the banner of RK Films, the legendary showman Raj Kapoor produced films rooted deeply in Indian culture. His masterworks were admired not just domestically but around the world. Awaara, Jagte Raho, Barsaat, Shree 420, Mera Naam Joker, Prem Rog, Satyam Shivam Sundaram to name but a few. Today, this iconic site has been reduced to a mundane 2BHK and 3BHK residential complex. Or take the case of Bhanu Athaiyya (Bhanumati Annasaheb Rajopadhye), the gifted costume designer behind more than a hundred films and India’s first Oscar winner (for Richard Attenborough’s ‘Gandhi’ in 1982). In her twilight years, she returned her award to the Academy for safekeeping, fearing it would not be properly cared for after her death. As India dreams big for its entertainment industry, it must also honour its past. WAVES, beyond launching prestigious awards, ought to foster an ecosystem that preserves this legacy, an inheritance capable of inspiring future generations.


In his speech, the Prime Minister rightly observed that ancient Indian culture is teeming with stories, and that every village possesses a unique tradition of storytelling. Indeed, ancient texts such as the Bhagavad Gita, Ramayana, Mahabharata, Vedas and Upanishads brim with imagination and narrative depth. Yet references to these works often spark polarising debates. One camp holds them up as proof of India’s advanced scientific and technological past; the other dismisses such claims as exaggerated or fantastical. It is true that certain themes in these texts like missiles, artificial rain, genetically engineered children, test-tube births, plastic surgery mirror ideas found in modern science fiction. But rather than wade into ideological controversies, the creative community envisioned by WAVES would do well to marvel at the boldness of imagination these texts display. That minds were dreaming on such a scale so audaciously and ahead of their time would have made Jules Verne and Arthur C. Clarke proud. Beyond technological parallels, these stories probe the human condition with a psychological complexity rarely matched. Their moral and philosophical messages retain their relevance even today. This alone warrants imaginative presentation to the world.


The Prime Minister, in his address, invoked the mythic origins of Indian music by mentioning Shiva’s damaru, Krishna’s bansuri, and Vishnu’s shankh-naad as reminders of the country’s deep-rooted artistic tradition. Yet in recent decades, much of India’s musical innovation has tilted toward hybridisation: East meets West in a blur of remixed folk tunes and borrowed beats. Too often, creativity has come to mean little more than old wine in glossier bottles or worse, a derivative mimicry of global trends.


The Indian film industry would do well to shed its self-imposed provincialism. Labels like Bollywood, Tollywood and Mollywood are not just inelegant; they are limiting. They tether the industry’s identity to Hollywood, implicitly casting it as a second act rather than an original production. A truly self-confident cultural ecosystem would cultivate its own aesthetic language, unburdened by imitation and free to chart its own course.


The same logic applies to gaming. Much of the sector’s current output caters to the lowest common denominator which is adrenaline, aggression and addiction. Games are often engineered to exploit the reward circuits of the brain rather than expand its horizons. Instead, designers should harness the medium’s immersive potential to foster learning, curiosity and wonder. Age-specific games that inform as much as they entertain could prove just as commercially viable and far more culturally valuable.


WAVES must not confine itself to the virtual or digital realm of ancient stories, films, music and gaming. Its ambition should be to extend into the physical world, merging these narratives with real-life experiences. This could be achieved through tourism, by designing immersive, culturally rich experiences for travellers. Creative advertising can play a vital role in promoting such a tourism model. Ancient tales and their modern resonances can be brought to life at the very locations they reference. Augmented reality offers the potential to seamlessly integrate the virtual and real, creating experiences that are both extraordinary and unforgettable.


The opportunities are vast. For WAVES to fulfil its potential, it must nurture a genuinely creative culture - one that reveres the past, thinks freely and avoids imitation. Only then will it be worthy of its name.


(The writer works in the Information Technology sector. Views personal.)

Comments

bottom of page