Simply Fly

by Capt G R Gopinath

  There was no way the customs could stop it, but they could delay the helicopter’s release. I decided to wait and watch. We appointed a customs agent for a legal fee to handle the release of the helicopter from customs. We were promised that the job would be completed by the evening. Life is however full of surprises: evening fell and the job had not been done. The agent assured us that it would be done the following day, but that didn’t not happen either.

  I began feeling nervous and decided to go to the airport myself. I went to meet the assistant commissioner of customs, waited for a couple of hours, and returned without having met him. Only one day remained before the launch. I had my back against the wall.

  I was at the airport early next day, hoping to get the clearance before noon. I would then have the rest of the day with the DGCA. The inauguration was at ten the following morning. The morning wore on, it was close to mid-day and the agent kept assuring me that the file would be signed at any moment.

  The DGCA office closed at 5.30 p.m. The pilot and engineer had to undertake a hover and ground run and certify it, and the DGCA had only to physically inspect the aircraft and stamp the logbook, certifying that this was a Deccan Aviation helicopter. All other documentation had been cleared. How was I to handle a situation like this? Even if the customs cleared the aircraft at 4.00 p.m., the DGCA would have very little time this evening.

  I hovered outside the customs assistant commissioner’s cabin and the officer eventually emerged at 4.30 p.m. He was casual and did not understand the gravity of my predicament. I walked along with him and introduced myself. He kept walking and did not acknowledge me. I repeatedly told him that I needed the customs to clear the aircraft. He responded brusquely and dismissively. He said, ‘Yes, Captain, I’ve been informed of your requirement. But I have absolutely no time today. I have been asked to go over immediately to the central office and if I am back at this office before 6:00 p.m. this evening, I can take a look at your papers. If everything is in place, I promise to clear your aircraft first thing tomorrow morning.’

  ‘I can’t wait for tomorrow,’ I said. ‘Tomorrow is the inauguration. You must clear it today. I still have work with the DGCA.’ I didn’t want to antagonize the official but did not want to give him a feeling that he could take it easy. I said, ‘Look, officer, this is extremely serious. It’s a question of life and death for me. You have got to do it now.’ He continued to walk towards his jeep and blurted out impatiently, ‘Captain, I can’t do it now. The commissioner of customs has summoned me. I’ll come back and see it this evening. I’ll give it to you first thing tomorrow morning. Nine o’clock!’

  As I tried to plead with him, the officer got into his jeep and sped off, leaving a trail of dust and smoke in my face.

  7

  If I am unable to make the Gods above relent, I shall move Hell.

  —Virgil

  Preparing for the Launch

  W

  hen the dust settled I looked at my watch. It was about 5 p.m. and I had eighteen hours for a reprieve. I was a desperate man. An advertisement had been inserted and would appear in the morning’s paper. A teaser ad had already appeared a few days ago and there was no turning back.

  I was livid with the customs agent and angry with myself for having trusted him. I resolved not to postpone the inauguration; I still had time. I contacted Reena Pandey at the PMO who, with her husband, had helped us get the licence from the aviation ministry. I explained to her that everything had been set, the inauguration was slated for the next day, all compliances had been met, the ministers had been invited, and the press had been informed but the customs had not cleared the aircraft. I gave her the name and telephone number of the additional customs commissioner, a phone call to whom would make all the difference. I impressed upon her that the lapse was not on our side: the helicopter had arrived three days ago and the customs had had enough time to scrutinize the documents. She now had all the information to equip her to request urgent action and tell the commissioner that there would be huge embarrassment for the government if the inauguration did not take place as a cabinet minister would be attending the event as chief guest. When there is no violation of rules and no special out-of-turn favours demanded, a call from the PMO usually sends a shiver down the spine of the bureaucrat concerned. To create additional pressure, I also requested a senior official in the chief minister’s secretariat to give the commissioner a call.

  Within half an hour of speaking to Reena, I got a call from T. Jayaraman, additional commissioner of customs. He was very pleasant over the phone, saying he had been briefed about the situation and asked me why I had not approached him earlier. I narrated my experience with the customs office during the past three days. ‘Mr Jayaraman, I wish I had met you. I did not have any reason to doubt that your officer would clear the papers. There is no violation of customs regulations on our part. The authorized customs agent assured me that clearance is a matter of due process. I did not wish to antagonize your official who was on the job. The promised due process has not however taken place, as I should have received the clearance yesterday.’ I did not fail to mention how the concerned officer had slammed the door on my face with rude indifference. Jayaraman was convinced and promised to call back, which he did after ten minutes, assuring me that the assistant commissioner of customs would call me shortly and clear my helicopter.

  It was 11 p.m. The assistant commissioner of customs, the gentleman who had shut the door on my face, called me. He was ready to release the helicopter right away but the files were in the custody of a customs appraiser who was at a farewell party. If I could bring him over, he would sign the papers. He gave me the address of the venue of the party.

  Without losing a minute, I drove in my jeep to trace the customs appraiser to the party which was being hosted at a resort on the outskirts of Bengaluru. As I entered the resort, I could hear loud music and sensed the party guests were in high spirits. It was a fairly large gathering with a lot of people milling around and I wondered how I could trace the person concerned. I asked around, praying that the appraiser had not left the party and gone home. Fortunately, someone pointed him out soon enough and I approached the young man.

  I, introducing myself, took him aside, and explained why I had been looking for him. I said I had been asked by the assistant commissioner to bring him right away to the airport to clear the aircraft. The young man was having a good time at the party and looked annoyed that an official chore awaited him well after midnight. He was also surprised at the suddenness and the unusualness of the demand. However, recovering quickly he agreed to step out with me.

  Located on the bottom rung of the hierarchy, the customs appraiser identifies a case as eligible or not for customs duty. He prepares documentation and sends it up to the assistant commissioner of customs. Providentially, it proved that the appraiser knew me and we shared a common past. ‘I believe you were in NDA,’ he began. ‘So was I. But for some reason I discontinued. I spent three years there. It was the greatest experience of my life,’ he said. ‘Being ex-NDA and now in the customs, I will be very happy to help you,’ he said. He made me privy to a little inside information. He had put up the documents to the assistant commissioner the previous day. Clearances should have been given yesterday. The assistant commissioner had not signed it for his own reasons. The young man smiled at me meaningfully.

  The farmhouse resort was at the other end of Bengaluru, near Yelahanka. In those days, the countryside around Bengaluru was dotted with clubs and resorts where officials and corporate staff gathered for the odd official or semi-official celebration. It took us an hour to drive to HAL. The assistant commissioner was waiting for us. He looked sheepish and I made every effort to avoid appearing one-up on the officer. He however surprised me by saying, ‘Captain, rather than putting pressure on us at two in the morning, you could have let me know you had an inauguration tomorrow. I would certainly have cleared it.’ With that his sagging pride was salvaged and I played along. He finished h
is report at about 2 a.m.

  Jayanth and Sam were waiting anxiously for the process to get through. The release papers were ready and all that the officer had to do was to physically see the helicopter and hand over the papers to us. There was yet another minor hitch. We were in the civilian enclave of the customs office and the helicopter was bonded in the defence hold-up area. We were running out of time. Jayanth quickly managed to secure special passes for all of us to enter the defence area inside the airport. During the next hour or so we had shown the customs officer the helicopter for physical verification and had finally got the aircraft in our possession.

  We now had one major last hurdle to cross: DGCA clearance to fly the helicopter. We left the hangar and went home. Jayanth was to return at 6 a.m. for a ground test and a hover test, and complete other DGCA formalities. We however realized that there were many clearances to be obtained for the ultimate commercial operator’s permit. We were faced with what seemed to be an insurmountable problem. We had brought the cup to the lip but there were still many a slip in between! At this most critical of all moments before the launch, N. Ramesh, head of air-worthiness of the DGCA in Delhi came to our rescue. He advised us that there was a provision in the rules that allowed a one-off ferry flight without passengers if the aircraft was air-worthy, and this would enable the authorities to use discretion and waive a number of formalities and requirements needed for full-fledged commercial operations. He also advised us to write a fresh letter asking the local DGCA to permit a one-off flight before the inauguration. We could obtain the commercial licence in the next couple of days. He promised to instruct his juniors in Bengaluru accordingly. I conveyed all this to Jayanth.

  Jayanth and the local DGCA had reached the airport in time. Jayanth did the ground test and the hover test and helped the DGCA complete a series of statutory requirements. At nine I was supposed to reach the CM’s office in Vidhana Soudha (the house of legislature) and bring him to the venue. I was still gripped by anxiety that some last minute hitch might prevent the helicopter from reaching the inaugural site in Jakkur airfield. Images of army life in remote border areas flitted past. During the wedding of an army officer or jawan posted at a remote location, the bridegroom gave the bride’s party many anguishing moments. He had to negotiate extremely difficult terrain and use various modes of transport to reach the bride’s home and the venue of the wedding. Occasionally he was stranded by a landslide or an avalanche along the way, missed a bus ride or a flight or ferry, and missed his own wedding. The wedding would however continue with the groom’s framed photograph serving as surrogate!

  I walked into the CM’s office at 9 a.m. The inauguration was just half an hour ahead. The CM was ready to leave with me. Five minutes before I met him, Jayanth called. He said the officer was lukewarm about giving us the certificates. He was unhappy about the pressure that we had brought to bear on him from Delhi. He was picking out flaws in the documentation. He had never done such a thing in his entire professional life and was concerned that giving clearance might lose him his job. He spoke his mind. He thought we were crazy. At the end of the long message there was a ray of light: Jayanth felt that it seemed that in the end the officer would eventually give us what we needed.

  Jayanth said: ‘Gopi, the helicopter is perfect. I’ve done a ground test and a hover run. I’m all set and ready to take off. But our guy here has yet to give me thumbs up! We have just twenty minutes left. What am I to do if I don’t get the go-ahead?’ I was still on the phone with Jayanth when the CM came out. ‘Captain, are you ready? Can we go?’ ‘Yes, sir,’ I replied

  I had a split second to decide. ‘Take off!’ I told Jayanth. ‘We will face what comes. The future takes care of itself.’ Once a resolution is made, whether for better or worse, the anxiety dissolves.

  Only after I had spoken to Jayanth did I realize I had given an army command. What if Jayanth flew in violation of a DGCA order! I decided that my current worries concerned the inauguration alone. I would tackle the future when it came.

  The CM and I now approached the airfield. I could see from a distance that the media had arrived. Reporters from newspapers and from a couple of TV channels which were broadcasting at the time were there. The venue bore a festive look. There were colourful festoons and confetti. People I could rely on had been entrusted with the responsibility of organizing the event. They had done a great job. They had set up shamianas and decorated the place. Everybody waited to give the CM a grand reception.

  I kept glancing to the east from out of the window of the car in the direction of the HAL airport. The car stopped but I did not avert my gaze and there was the unmistakable speck of a helicopter approaching. Our car entered the special bay for the CM to alight. The car came to a measured halt and, as though specially choreographed to act in synchrony, the helicopter landed in a perfect touchdown. There was thunderous ovation in acknowledgement.

  We led the CM to the stage. There were other ministers, dignitaries, and senior bureaucrats. I gave a short welcoming speech and thanked the CM for giving us the land in Jakkur and for agreeing to be our first customer. The CM lit a lamp and made a speech. He said, ‘When I looked at this young captain, I was moved. How could I not but help him?’ He wished us all the best and then inaugurated the first flight. The helicopter took off to booming applause from the guests and headed back to HAL.

  I called and thanked Reena and all the others who had helped me. I also kept my promise to Doug and had the lease deposit money transferred the following day. I was leaving for Montreal that midnight for the second session of Henry Mintzberg’s programme. I was concerned that I still needed the operational clearance for commercial flying—there is nothing more useless than a helicopter sitting on the ground! I called Sam and Jayanth and shared this anxiety with them before I flew out of Bengaluru. We knew it was a matter of a couple of days and they said they would take care of it.

  Things worked out in the end and without much delay. Sam went and camped in Delhi. Together with our good old army friend, Col. D.V. Singh, Sam saw us through the bureaucratic maze. In a couple of days, we received a licence to operate non-scheduled charter flights. We were in business, as the saying goes. We only needed customers to fly. We shifted focus from the bureaucracy to marketing and sales.

  There is a parallel between the mind of the entrepreneur and the mind of an artist. Camus described the artist’s mind to be chaotic, but the practise of art requires enormous amounts of self-discipline. It requires the ability to choose from infinite possibilities. It requires the discipline to sit down and do things. The creative mind has a tendency to free itself from discipline. It tends towards chaos. Creative people, including entrepreneurs, need to inculcate the ability and the balance to tread this fine line between creativity and systems-and-processes. Being aware of my inadequacies as an entrepreneur, I forced myself to acquire a rudimentary knowledge of finance and accounting.

  On the flight to Montreal, I tried to imagine who my first customer would be. I conjured up all kinds of potential clients. Who, however, would be the first to call? I experienced torment, anticipation, and elation. The truth had still not sunk in that I was now the CEO of a helicopter company. I had felt the same when I had decided to take to farming, and also the first night I had spent on the farm, in the open, gazing at the night sky.

  I kept calling the office and I was told that the phones had been continually ringing but the first commercial flight had not materialized. All of them were in a state of expectant excitement.

  Whenever I recognized a note of despondency I encouraged them and said it was just a question of time and things would definitely happen. I somehow possessed inextinguishable optimism which I shared with the others. I said the innumerable calls they were receiving were a pointer to future business.

  I realized too how difficult it was to capture the country’s imagination. Marketing and advertising continue to remain an open area of inquiry for me. Advertising is a necessary spend, but how much and how fr
equently? A helicopter sitting on the ground burns a big hole in the pocket. Advertising, when it is not effective, burns one more hole in the pocket. Effective advertising is a continuing dilemma. Advertising guru David Ogilvy is a man I admire greatly. Ogilvy once said, ‘When I write an advertisement, I don’t want you to tell me that you find it creative. I want you to find it so interesting that you buy the product. When Aeschines spoke, they said, “How well he speaks.” But when Demosthenes spoke, they said, “Let us march against Philip.”’ The CEO of Ryan Air had said something similar: ‘Forget all the ponytails that come and give you some creative nonsense. The only test of your advertisement: does it make the customer want to buy your product? Can your ad increase your revenues?’

  We were novices in business and had no formal training in running it. In one way this helped because our minds were open to new ideas and innovations. We were based in Bengaluru but our customer could be from anywhere in India or the world. The investment climate was opening up and many foreign companies were looking for helicopters to help them undertake surveys of prospective sites. Customers with money wanted to pare off several days from travel time entailed in road or train journeys. It was a real challenge to catch the attention of the world with a limited budget. While Air Deccan was able to capture the people’s imagination in a different way and is a household name, even to this day I encounter people who have never heard of Deccan Aviation although it began earlier and has existed far longer.

  The highly differentiated media viewership—the vast number of television channels and newspapers—made it extremely difficult to choose where, when, and how many times to advertise. Market research companies came up with vast statistics and chart overlays to give you a choice of exposure but the budgets these entailed could simply wipe you out of business. This was therefore where my native intelligence came in handy. It told me to look for alternatives. I discovered that the best way to advertise on a shoestring budget is to get the media to talk about you. It takes an intuitive understanding to gauge what makes a good story. The reforms process had helped increase the competition among the media institutions. This was because there was a new newspaper or a new TV channel opening up every day. The reforms had helped break down the monopoly that existed and the media was now hungry for good stories because they were in competition with one another. He who lands the meaty story first gets a premium in the market which increases his circulation or viewership. That’s how the media work.