Your move, Mr Singh

It is impossible to feel optimistic about Air India without completely suspending rational judgement. Every time the state-owned airline looks like it might be slowly turning its fate around, it runs into trouble, usually self-inflicted. The latest round of flight cancellations by the airline will be particularly damaging; India’s flyers are coming to detest uncertainty, and they will be willing to pay a greater-than-ever premium to ensure that the flight they’re booking at least takes off. The pilots’ strike that has caused the cancellations is a reflection of two things: first, the inability of the airline’s pilots to realise the perils that the company is in, and their addiction to blackmailing the government. And, second, the incomplete and ill-judged nature of the merger between the erstwhile Indian Airlines and Air India.

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