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  SIMPLY FLY

  A Deccan Odyssey

  CAPT G.R. GOPINATH

  With a Foreword by A.P.J. Abdul Kalam

  and

  a special story by Henry Mintzberg

  An Imprint of HarperCollins Publishers

  To my father:

  Who taught me that

  I must dream but not envy.

  I must lose myself in action but not in despair.

  To my wife:

  Who sacrificed everything and stuck with me and my ‘madness’

  and displayed stoic courage.

  To my buddies Capt. Sam, Capt. Jayanth and Capt. Vishnu who are

  really the ‘unsung heroes’. Without whom the story of Deccan

  would not have happened.

  And most significantly all the colleagues, close to 4000 of them,

  who gave their heart and might to Deccan and gave wings

  to the Common Man.

  CONTENTS

  Foreword

  Introduction

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Gopi’s Farm

  Index

  FOREWORD

  I

  am happy to write the foreword for the book Simply Fly—A Deccan Odyssey, the autobiography of Captain G. R. Gopinath, the father of Indian low-cost airlines. Inspired by the story of Vietnamese orphan girl who takes to flying helicopters to help her country rebuild after the 1969–75 Vietnam war, Capt. Gopinath takes up flying low-cost airlines as his venture. This also demonstrated the spirit of true entrepreneurship as defined by Peter Drucker who says, ‘Entrepreneur is one who creates wealth where it did not exist earlier by creating a new market and a new customer. They create something new, something different, they change and transmute values; and on a size and scale that will impact society.’ The low-cost airline created by Capt. Gopinath became a pace-setter for the entire aviation business in India and brought about healthy competitiveness in the Indian aviation sector. In each and every task undertaken by Capt. Gopinath right from his army days, he has shown his indomitable spirit. The book is an inspiring story of a young man whose courage to take risks in life results in providing a new dimension to the air-transportation sector. Deccan Airlines emerged out of his vision and passion for flying high in life. Every chapter of the book gives a feeling of his determination to get things done inspite of all the challenges.

  I liked particularly liked the chapter on the foundations of a new venture, where he describes about his first encounter with politics and the ordeal he had to undergo in election campaigning and ultimately losing the election by a huge margin. Though he had no money to fight an election on his own, he had the inner confidence that he could create something out of nothing. Another interesting chapter is the one which describes his preparation for the helicopter launch, where he describes his risk taking capabilities. Without any formal approval from the DGCA for flying a helicopter, he went ahead with the inauguration of the first helicopter service with the then chief minister presiding over the function and flying him in the helicopter.

  After reading Simply Fly, I felt that this book containing invaluable entrepreneurial and leadership experience should be an eminently suitable guide for entrepreneurs and could be prescribed as a text book in all the management and entrepreneurial development institutions in the country, since it is an Indian experience. It is my hope that this book will help inspire readers to take challenges as they come and explore new vistas in life. I wish Capt. Gopinath success in all his future endeavours.

  INTRODUCTION

  T

  his is not a ‘How to Book’. It’s everything but that. This is just a simple story of a poor village boy who after doing myriad things in life built India’s largest airline. It is a very personal journey capturing my early years in a village, my days with the Indian Army, my eventual return to the village as almost a refugee in a literal and metaphorical sense, and my subsequent ventures in life.

  This is my story.

  I set off on a voyage of ‘discovery’ and pitched a tent in a remote, barren grazing land—allotted to my family as compensation for land taken away by the government for building the dam across the river Hemavathy. I lived in a tent and then a mud-thatch hut for many years, and took to taming and farming the land. For the next fifteen years my life was entwined with the land, with its ebb and flow, its seasons, its rhythms, its sighs, moods, its very breath, its gentle rains and the mystic magic of monsoons, its playful truant teasing ways. It almost echoed something I had read by my favourite poet, Tagore:

  … like the atmosphere round the earth where lights and shadows play hide-and-seek, and the wind like a shepherd boy plays upon its reeds among flocks of clouds. It never undertakes to lead anybody anywhere to any solid conclusion or any definiteness of an answer; yet it reveals endless spheres of light, … it has only the music that teases us out of thought as it fills our being.

  And oh, the monsoon rains! Its fury and its fickleness, its indifference and absence which wreaked havoc on our lives, yet in the end taught me a stoic resignation without bitterness or despair. I possessed little but was suffused with ineffable, inexplicable joy.

  But, in the end, we all have to live and work for a living and find our meaning and salvation through good meaningful work. My life in rural India enriched and ennobled me—farming, poverty, debt, and often when it all seemed the very end with my back to the wall, I tapped into an unknown inexhaustible well of optimism and energy to get up each time after falling, summon strength and courage and start all over again!

  I was forever seeking and forever striving. I lived two lives, like a palimpsest—one imposed over the other—while life in the country intoxicated me and I roamed like a ‘musk deer mad with mirth and drunk on its own perfume’, I was also repeatedly brought back to earth, to try to earn a living, and feed a family and constantly, instinctively unbeknown to myself, found myself in venture after venture.

  I reared cattle to sell milk, got in poultry farming, silkworm farming, then turned a motor cycle dealer, an Udupi hotel owner, a stock broker, irrigation equipment dealer, an agriculture consultant, a politician and finally an aviation entrepreneur—struggling, falling, rising, falling, rising again and taking off.

  In a sense my story is the story of the new India. The India of possibilities in spite of all her problems of poverty, ignorance, corruption, bureaucratic apathy. The turmoil, and unrest, mindless violence. Crazy, insane, gross, and grotesque politics. And yet I feel enveloped in a great magnificence, a refulgence, a kind of luminous morning light which bathes my body and fills my soul.

  When I was running Deccan Helicopters and later Air Deccan and my earlier ventures, I was like a man possessed. The competition did not know how to deal with me, my colleagues and my family did not know what to do with me; and even I did not know how to deal with myself. I needed to be ‘exorcized! I was inconsiderate, sometimes ruthless, and brutally pushed people almost to the edge. As one colleague in an interview to the media when asked to describe me said—‘He’s always angry , is always very impatient ….’

  I have not been an ideal leader, husband or father. While young I was arrogant, dogmatic, argumentative, delinquent, intolerant towards others’ failings but tolerant of my own; selfish, short tempered and would fly into a rage and may have appeared a ‘pompous fool’ to elders and even my contemporaries. I was probably a tyrant also with my wife and children and made them su
ffer needlessly and helplessly while I was obsessed with whatever venture I had embarked upon. It troubles me still that I could have been a better boss, friend, son, husband and father. Like Somerset Maugham said in his A Writer’s Note Book:

  I have done various things I regret, but I make an effort not to let them fret me; I say to myself that it is not I who did them, but a different I that I was then. I injured some, but since I could not repair the injuries I had done I have tried to make amends by benefitting others.

  Many strangers and some friends who all have not been named here came into my life like ‘angels’ and helped me and saved me from many disasters and perilous circumstances. And a few of those glorious friendships in the rough and tumble of life and business, because of incompatibilities, intolerance, ego, pettiness or want of magnanimity got swept away in the rush and vortex of the tide of business and life. It is a haunting regret that I did not do enough to save those friendships.

  After the success of Air Deccan, whenever I went on speaking engagements both here and abroad, one question was invariably flung at me. How could I, the son of a poor school teacher, with nothing but a paltry sum of Rs 6000 as my settlement money from the army build an airline, which is the most capital intensive business? When they heard what I did, many came and urged me to write my story.

  So, here it is. If you detect ‘hubris’ here or arrogance, I need your indulgence. If you are young, with dreams of making a difference—but struggling, getting beaten, feeling cheated, frustrated and trying to surmount the odds, and about to throw in your towel, don’t emulate everything that is here—try to beat your own path, your own trail. If you are older and wiser, have been there and done that, and seen it all, just read it for the lark and enjoy the story.

  1

  Heaven lies about us in our infancy!

  —William Wordsworth

  Growing up by the River

  S

  nuggled somewhere deep within the Western Ghats, beyond Mudigere, lies the source of a pretty river called Hemavathy. This is the south-western corner of Karnataka. Meandering through the lower ranges, the river flows past hundreds of small hamlets before joining the Kaveri as its principal tributary. Gorur, of which I have vivid and pleasant childhood memories of my parents and my home, is one such village situated along the banks of the Hemavathy. It is not surprising that people in these parts consider the river sacred, for Hemavathy is Gorur’s lifeline, watering its fields and sustaining the settlements along its banks. Looking back with fondness, there is a realization that quaint old Gorur, attractive in its own way, holds a special place in my heart.

  A few words may not be appropriate to describe the lush countryside and the alluring landscape of Gorur and its neighbourhood, where I spent my early years. Located 23 km to the south of Hassan, the district headquarters, the settlement has an abundance of coconut groves, areca plantations, betel-leaf creepers, paddy fields, and mango orchards. The village, like many others in this region, has been a beneficiary of the water management technology evolved over centuries by local chieftains and the maharajas of Mysore, who built check-dams further upstream to facilitate irrigation of thousands of acres of farmland. These stonework barriers were constructed employing simple, eco-friendly technology that caused no deforestation or displacement of local residents, allowing the river to flow perennially, supporting human, animal, and plant life all along its course.

  Gorur lies on the fringes of Malnad, which means the ‘land of hills’ and also the ‘land of rains’ in Kannada. It refers specifically to the southern ranges of the Western Ghats of Karnataka and their foothills. Malnad features some well-known towns such as Mudigere, Chikmaglur, Shringeri, Madikeri, and Tirthahalli. The hillside is awash with coffee estates and dense pristine rainforests.

  Like most other Indian villages, Gorur had its clearly defined social hierarchy. The village was a composite one, with separate quarters marked out for Brahmins, fishermen, shopkeepers, carpenters and other tradesmen. There was tacit power play between the various communities and castes. When there were disputes or important settlements, the village gowda or patel had the final say, and the Brahmins were still generally considered superior to all the other residents though they wielded no real power. Exchange of articles and services between communities was not exactly taboo. However, the Dalit colony was set apart from the rest of the village, outside the main boundary, an unfortunate tradition inherited from the past.

  My father, like his father before him, was a school teacher and a farmer by profession. He taught in a neighbouring village, and though poorly paid he continued in this profession, for him a labour of love. There were many like my father, teachers who were paid a pittance—worked hard, and lived frugally. Father remained a teacher for forty years, each day waking up at daybreak, walking miles to his school and walking back at the end of the day to reach home at sundown.

  I was born not in Gorur but at my mother’s parental home in Melkote, an ancient temple town near Mysore. It is famous as a centre for the followers of scholar—saint Ramanuja.

  My maternal grandfather was a Sanskrit scholar who also performed priestly duties. My mother often visited her native town and I accompanied her. Indeed, for us children, vacation was when our mothers went visiting their native villages. I roamed the beautiful countryside with my grandfather and my cousins. We explored water tanks, temple ruins, and the rugged hillsides, where from a distance, were visible layers upon layers of brownish-yellow rocks, balanced one on top of another like loaves of bread. My grandfather was a member of a group of Sanskrit scholars, and I was privy to what they discussed and debated. I saw and touched palm leaf manuscripts secured in folios; I watched as scholars sat at a low desk and wrote on palm leaves using special writing equipment.

  In Gorur, distinctions of caste and profession were once considered crucial to sustain the social hierarchy. As a Brahmin boy, I was aware of an unwritten code of conduct, which compelled artisans and Dalits to live at a distance from us in separate colonies. The Brahmins were not particularly well-off, but assumed they were different and maintained the social distinction.

  As a boy, I was also conscious of the difference in status between the exploiters and the exploited. This was largely because my father was not a typical Brahmin and spoke disapprovingly of the system that encouraged and justified the ‘superiority’ of many upper castes and their exploitation of the artisan class and the Dalits.

  My father did not enrol me in school till the fifth standard. He believed, like Gandhi, Tagore, and our own Shivaram Karanth that schools are systems of regimentation and that children are better off at open-air schools, free from the burden of examinations. He said, quoting Tagore, ‘Real education is in life’s experiences; school is like a jail,’ and told me, ‘Look, Gopi, I’ll teach you at home!’

  Each morning my father woke me up at dawn and took me for a dip in the river Hemavathy. This became an unchanging ritual. Even in pouring rain we went to the river. After the swim we returned home for breakfast. He then took me to the coconut and areca-nut plantations that stood like islands in an ocean of paddy-fields. Being different, he never performed sandhya vandana, the tribute to the Sun god, but the act of bathing in the river at daybreak was for him a gesture of reverence.

  As we walked to the small family areca garden, father showed me the Dalit men and women in the paddy-fields, soaking wet to the bone, transplanting saplings. He would draw examples from their lives for my benefit. ‘You are a Brahmin,’ he would say. ‘You are supposed to be sophisticated and cultured in the arts. But look at these people. Their women sing while working; these poor farmers sing because there is joy in their hearts.’

  These people came to work with two bags. Into one bag they threw tiny crabs that hopped around in the slush and into the other they stuffed wild greens growing all around. Father identified the local greens for me. He explained how the ‘lowly’ greens were in fact full of nutrition. Most people at the time were vegetarian. It was considered
demeaning to eat crabs. Even hardcore non-vegetarians did not eat crab or beef. Dalits ate both and belonged to the lowest rung of the social hierarchy. Only many years later, while travelling in Europe did I learn that crabs are considered among the most expensive seafood delicacies. In India, in urban areas, mushrooms were until recently available only at five star hotels. In the countryside the Indian farmer has picked and eaten mushrooms free for centuries, when weeding and planting the fields. My father would often point to the Dalits and say, ‘Take a look! Their bodies are like steel.’

  He often read to me the books he most loved. These influenced me greatly in those formative years, and even later in my life. He taught me arithmetic and the sciences for an hour or so every morning after our swim, and also on most evenings. He also read out from the classics, which included the writings of Gandhi, Tagore, Socrates through Plato’s works, Emerson, and Oliver Goldsmith.

  My mother was a devout lady, generous, hospitable, and a culinary expert who spent a lot of time in the kitchen. Many still recall her warm hospitality during their stay with our family. Once in the US, after I had delivered a speech, someone from the audience came up to me and said, ‘Capt. Gopi, I was part of a World Bank team that visited Gorur twenty years ago. I remember your mother. We had been invited to your home and your mother served us the most delicious meal.’ In later life, I met quite a number of people who had vivid memories of my mother, long after she had passed away. People close to the family would often say to me, ‘You know, Gopi, your mother’s grace is guarding you!’

  In sharp contrast to my mother’s generosity, my father tended to be frugal. My mother went out of her way to shower hospitality while my father refused to entertain freeloaders and was austere in his dealings. Mother was religious while father was an agnostic of sorts and had no faith in rituals. He, however, never interfered with my mother’s ways. He was more of a mystic, and when my mother went to the temple, he took me on his lap and read out passages from Gandhi’s and Tagore’s writings. He usually read out a couple of his favourite Tagore poems: