My friend, Ravi, responded via e-mail to my ranting about the end of affordable flying in India and the note that we might be slipping back to socialism..
I understand that there will be no Rs.99/- deals in future (Yes, Rs.99! + Taxes, which are close to 20 times the price of the ticket). There should not have been such deals in the first place. Many airlines to gain market share have priced their fares dirt cheap and are now facing the consequences. If they are not even making money to pay the salaries, how are they going to become profitable by bearing operating costs and considering all loans they are unable to repay even after 5-10 years of starting their operations.
In a way I feel it is good that the airline sector is making some adjustments at-least now but the managements made some blunders in implementation of their ideas. If you followed the story of Jet employees getting sacked, it looks ridiculous and shows how stupid the management was. This is a perfect example as to how a company will have to take back it’s decisions due to social pressures if it makes decisions without proper implementation plan. People like Raj Thackeray making comments like the Jet airways will not be allowed to land if the employees are not taken back, etc and his previous hatred comments against North Indians shows how narrow minded politicians are able to speak whatever they want and can come to limelight and ENJOY their actions.Read the below article which describes how a CEO of a company was attacked and killed recently in India. There may be various versions of the same story but what bothers me most is people get away with no one being held accountable for the crime.Also, there are so many political games in all states in India that it has become difficult to feel secure to do any business though you abide by the law, unless you have local support. Recent move of Tata Nano plant from Singur in W.Bengal to Gujarat is a perfect example of how things can turn due to political gains.Yes, there is corruption anywhere in the world but in India you can get away with relatively easily, even if caught. This is a major setback and I fear things will get much worse before some radical decision comes out later to tackle such situations.Sorry for going into social aspect of the problem rather than financial aspect.Anyways, we need to have political power to do anything better for the society on the large scale and to get there we will face the same issues of combating corrupt and dangerous politicians who are ready to do anything to regain their position.I will go back and spend money for the betterment of the system if I win BigGame 🙂