Air India Regrets Rescheduling Of Your Flight…

If you fly Air India out of the long-standing loyalty for the national airline or out of compulsion being employed by the Government of India you must be acutely aware of the ‘Regrets’ service. The deadliest manifestation of this ‘service’ comes usually in the dead of the night when you are desperate to get at least 2/3 hours’ sleep for your early morning flight and suddenly all sleep is robbed away most inhumanely making you wonder if you are going to reach your destination the next day at all.

Once you are booked into one of the flights of Air India you cannot escape from this persistent service. For the period from one day before to minutes before the departure of the flight you will definitely get flooded with text messages on your mobile or emails announcing that ‘Air India Regrets Rescheduling of You Flight AI__ on ___  to ____ hours…’. The ‘Regrets’ content is very unpredictable with ‘regretted’ delays ranging from 20 minutes to over 5 hours. Short-term-delay ‘regrets’ get you reach the airport with some assurance, but there, to your dismay, the regrets keep on to the job of delaying your flight. Even after the ‘regrets’ finally disappear from your mobile you are still not sure when the flight would depart leading to ‘unexplained’ and ‘not regretted’ delays.

The most intriguing part of the ‘regrets’ syndrome is that Air India still regrets even if their flight is on time. The text message would say ‘Air India regrets rescheduling of your flight AI___ on__ to ___ hours. Pls ignore if revised timing is same as in your ticket.’ If you are a practical mix of intelligence and experience you would perhaps anticipate delays once you get the message and it happens in most cases. However, you cannot wait and have to go to the airport on time for whatever ‘regrets’ are to follow later for whatever ‘operational reasons’.

The ‘Regrets’ syndrome of Air India is a direct outcome of the negative mindset about the airlines both within and outside. The cash-starved and struggling airline hardly generates confidence or trust in its employees or for the Government of India or for the air travelers. Other airlines announce proudly that their flights are dot on time and in any case they would never bother the travelers with text messages or emails if their flights are departing on time.

It really is perplexing why Air India cannot talk positive for at least the positive aspects. It would not cost them to generate a different message announcing right-time flights apart from the normal ‘regrets’ message for delays. Furthermore, there have been some positive developments for the airline since the forgettable days of 2011-12 when its employees were observing annual strike fests and their schedules were topsy-turvy. Since then their website has improved a lot making online booking very easy and convenient. Their executives on the ticket counters have become more professional and friendlier. Air-hostesses often criticized for being overage are now conducting things quite well. Air India also showed practical sense of saving money by serving only tea-biscuits on flights of less than two hours duration instead of the fried rice dishes served in even less than one hour flights earlier. Therefore, it is time indeed for feeling positive when it is positive and get on serving and earning better. If people call you a circus then only you are helping them to form such opinions.

Air India, please stop regretting the good things. Regret only when it is really regrettable. Most practical advice at the moment would be to minimize delays absolutely.

Movie PK: Looking Afresh At The Indian Way Of Life!

An alien lands on planet earth in that roundish kind of spacecraft we are used to watching in Hollywood and to some extent in Bollywood movies too. First thing that happens to him on earth is that his round blipping tracking system hung on his neck gets stolen and the alien loses all contact with his planet. If you are geared up for a sci-fi movie it ends just there. After that he is like a stark naked new-born baby (not exactly!) about to discover the ways of life on earth—mind you, essentially the Indian way of life. His intensely focused eyes display the heart-rending innocence and insatiable curiosity. He is perplexed at every step—being astounded by the dresses and costumes people wear, being piqued by the languages people speak and thoroughly confused by the religious practices and rituals people believe and indulge in. His innocently meaningful and hard-hitting questions make the people around him laugh or mock or get intrigued or get angry or even get violent.  The divinely complicit ‘wrong numbers’ or ‘companies’ or ‘duplicate gods’ brought around by the unstoppable PK remain with the viewers throughout. His escapades earn him the title of PK (in Hindi it means ‘come drunk?’) and PK is of course played by Aamir Khan making it one of his most challenging roles. The earth odyssey of PK begins.

Movie PKhas a uniquely simple plot told beautifully, delightfully, indicatively, hilariously and poignantly as the inimitable storytelling style of director-writer Rajkumar Hirani goes. All his films including PK have that vibrant positive energy that drives the narration effortlessly engrossing the moviegoers all the way. The ‘story’ in PK attracts Jaggu (Anushka Sharma) who returns home from abroad after a somewhat misunderstood love angle with a Pakistani boy and joins an Indian television news channel. Jaggu starts following PK relentlessly around and after being convinced of his ‘alien’ nature she persuades her channel producer (Boman Irani) to get the story on air serially and PK becomes a celebrity.  On his initial struggle PK makes a lovable acquaintance Bhairav Singh (Sanjay Dutt) who helps him escape from tricky situations and ‘learn’ languages in his unique alien way. PK starts communicating in fluent Bhojpuri adding fun and frolic to the plot. The ‘dancing cars’ also helped him in a significant way procuring the dresses he wants!

Some scenes remain with you. Like PK going into a temple with a Puja Thali or walking into a church or mosque often chased out, like his obsession of distributing the posters of ‘missing gods’, like making ‘religious investments and earning enormous profits’ at the base of a tree where he plants an icon, like chasing the actor clad as Lord Shiva around, his dialogues with Jaggu and the channel producer and many other situations that make you howl with laughter while moving you to introspect compulsively or moving you to plain tears.

True to his intensity and perfection for any role Aamir Khan carries the movie with him all the way dishing out one of the most memorable performances. Aamir Khan is now associated in making Bollywood Box Office history three times—his ‘3 Idiots’becoming the first Bollywood movie to cross 200 crores in rupees (2 billion), his ‘Dhoom 3’ becoming the first Bollywood movie to cross 250 crores (2.5 billion) and now his PK crossing 300 crores (3 billion) for the first time in Bollywood history and still counting. For the international market too PK has made history crossing 600 crores (6 billion) for the first time and is now ranked 65^thall time grosser worldwide. Making the movie experience more pleasurable Anushka Sharma as Jaggu matches Aamir at every step and impresses with her natural flair for acting. Parikshit Sahni, Sanjay Dutt, Boman Irani and Saurabh Shukla in other major roles are also delightful. Sushant Singh Rajput is immensely likeable too in a cameo.

Having said everything PK does not seem to surpass Hirani’s earlier creations. The usual punch of his Munnabhai films and 3 Idiots was somewhat missing in the climax scene of PK when PK was engaged in a live debate with the main religious leader (Saurabh Shukla). The intended punch that usually leads to a free flow of emotions and tears suddenly became personalized bringing in the love angle of Jaggu and the reunion thereof thus diluting the universality. The love angle of PK with Jaggu could also have been avoided. Further, a few of the songs of the movie seem to disturb the narration, because when splendid visuals are unfolding before you the playback ‘acting’ is hardly required. However, these are minor issues as far as the epic tale of rediscovering Indian way of life is concerned.

Surprisingly, this beautiful movie is not spared by controversy. Some religious protesters vandalized theaters in different parts of India including Maharashtra alleging insults to reigning deities and demanding a ban on the movie. Apparently most of the protesters did not watch the full movie. Fortunately, central BJP leaders and Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis showed timely maturity brushing aside the allegations and coming in support of PK.  The ugly was not allowed to show its face again in India and beauty of creativity won. But for this controversy box office collections could have been still higher. If you gave the movie a miss due to this then amend it and watch PKdefinitely.

Cricket: India Manage To Save Sydney Test, Australia Win Border-Gavaskar Trophy!

Australia The Deserving Winners of Border-Gavaskar Trophy

Overcoming a mini batting collapse in the middle India have clung on to saving the fourth and final Test match against Australia in Sydney today and have finally settled for a nail-biting draw. In the first Test in Adelaide India were 2 down needing 159 runs for victory at Tea with Virat Kohli and Murali Vijay at the crease. From there they crashed to a 48 run defeat while not giving up the chase. It was similar in Sydney today as India were 160 for 2 at the Tea interval again with Murali Vijay and Virat Kohli at the crease needing another 189 runs for victory.

Rahane Holds Firm

India looked to be sitting pretty at Tea in Sydney today for a safe draw while not going for the chase outright since the morning session. At that moment draw was the most likely result and an Australian win was least expected. However, with a superior bowling attack and a never-say-die attitude Australia triggered a mini Indian collapse from 160/2 to 208/6 in the final session thanks to unpredictable bounce with the ball rising or keeping low, reverse swinging and a turning pitch. Vijay got out for 80, a settled Kohli for 46, Suresh Raina for one more duck earning him a pair and a promising Saha of the first innings getting out for a duck too. Another India humiliation was in the offing with Nathan Lyon, Mitchell Starc and Hazelwood firing on all cylinders as Ashwin who hit a half century in the first innings was back in the pavilion quickly. Fortunately Ajikya Rahane was still at the crease fighting it out and Bhuvaneshwar Kumar, once again, gave him solid support. They batted out more than 12 tense overs with at least Aussie fielders surrounding them at all times. The final India score was 252/7 off 89.5 overs.

The draw ensured Australia winning the Border-Gavaskar Trophy-2014-15 2-0. The living legends Allan Border and Sunil Gavaskar were present on the award ceremony. On a positive note in the four-match Test Series India was not outplayed except for the bowling and it had been an absorbing Series. Australia won two crucial tosses at Adelaide and Sydney where turning pitches could have helped Indian spinners on the last day. While Aussie captain Steven Smith made many records with four centuries Virat Kohli for India replied splendidly with four centuries too. Along with him Indian batsmen Murali Vijay, Ajinkay Rahane and to some extent Lokesh Rahul came out with trumps making the Series a closely fought one. But for India’s stunning bowling inability and unpredictable batting collapses with the tail not wagging enough the final result of the Series could have been reversed. Under Virat Kohli’s leadership a young Team India looks promising in Test cricket from here onwards. The Scorecard:

Now, the excitement of the one day cricket is about to unfold with the Tri-Series involving Australia, England and India starting from 16^th January, 2015. This is going to be a different ball game altogether with the specialist shorter-format captain MS Dhoni coming back. The three teams will confront one another two times in the league stage before the best two teams meet in the final on 1^st February in Perth. And of course, shortly after that the ICC World Cup 2015 starts from 14^th February in different venues of Australia and New Zealand.