#23 out of 94 Airlines A minimum of 10 flight-reports within the past two years is required to appear in the rankings.
22 reviews
Indian domestic sector reports rarely gather more than 500 views here — not even my AI A350 report did that well — but this is still worth exploring, nonetheless, because the two airports involved are truly awesome at every stage of the journey.
Having kickstarted my grand Christmas/New Year 2023–24 adventure with a Singapore Airlines A380 to Mumbai, I was all set to spend the night at Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport (BOM) and its glitzy Terminal 2, one of my favourites in the world for both architectural design and retail amenities. The feeling of being home — India, that is (not my home city, though) — was energising, and seeing familiar people and places, not to mention prices and products, was itself an open-armed welcome. I planned to spend the night in the terminal itself, in the hope of getting at least some sleep — not that I got a lot! — followed by an early-morning Vistara A320neo flight to my parents’ home of Bengaluru, which itself boasts of one of the most luxurious and awarded terminals in South Asia if not the world.
For the better part of the night, I stayed in the massive departure hall, with flights to countless destinations near and far, and a diversity of airlines that rivalled Bangkok Suvarnabhumi. Only at 2:30 did check-in for domestic Vistara flights open, and I was shocked beyond belief to know that I had been upgraded to Premium Economy! On top of which the A320neo operating this flight, VT-TQT, was barely a month old and had been delivered just two weeks before!!! Needless to say, that made me giddy with excitement and took away most of my sleep. Before that, though, I’d need to put my just-activated Priority Pass membership — courtesy of Citibank Singapore’s PremierMiles card (2 free lounge visits per calendar year) — to the test, and intended to spend at least a couple of hours at a domestic lounge to use up one of two free visits for 2023.
The only one in the domestic part of the Terminal 2 departures was the Adani Lounge (named after the same group that operates the airport itself), which looked grand and opulent from the pictures — and indeed it was. However, I’m afraid that it had perhaps the craziest line to enter that I’d ever seen, with people jostling for space, which was all the more shocking at 3:30 in the middle of the night. It shows just how much Indians with credit cards have made a beeline for these lounges, forcing banks like Axis Bank and HDFC to start cutting down on lounge-access benefits. That aside, the lounge was excellent, as you’d expect from this world-class airport, and the sumptuous breakfast buffet with both Indian and Western options was on par with any five-star hotel. If you can brave the crowds, the Adani Lounge is very much worth the visit for its food options, but don’t expect tranquil and calm here like you do at Bengaluru’s phenomenal 080 Domestic Lounge.
A happy triplet: from zero Vistara flights to three over a year
For the early-morning hop from BOM to BLR, I picked Vistara because, of course, there’s no knowing how much longer they will last before being swallowed up by Air India. Specifically I wanted to fly the VT-TQ* series of A320neos, which were all recent builds. While not as vast as IndiGo’s never-ending succession of A320neo deliveries — the VT-II*, IP* and IQ* series were all delivered in the past two years alone, with the VT-IX* series next — they were still very new indeed. (The latest, VT-TQX, was built just a couple of months ago at the time of writing, in February 2024!) They do not, however, offer seatback IFE, with only a streaming IFE system (Vistara World) instead, which was also provided on the now-retired 737-800 and A320ceo fleets.
I could very well have gone for an even earlier departure — UK845 at 6am — which was operated by the A321neo, currently the only Indian narrowbody with seatback IFE. However I’d already flown that product in March 2023, on the same SIN–BOM sector as the preceding leg on the A380, except that was a late-morning flight as against the evening A380 flight. Moreover, it was operated by VT-TVE, which also has a ’50 Aircraft Strong’ sticker on the left side, and I felt there was no point in flying that premium product again on a 1.5-hour hop. (My recent Air India A350 flight in the reverse direction doesn’t count.) So the A320neo it was for this leg, and I was richly rewarded with not only the VT-TQ* series but one of the newest aircraft in the entire fleet — and in Premium Economy at that!
This was my third flight overall on Vistara, and may very well be my last before its Air India merger. I hadn’t flown the airline prepandemic, so my first flight on UK was at the fag end of 2022 — the last of 15 flights that year — from Bengaluru to Hyderabad. This was operated by VT-TNN, an all-economy A320neo — and its oldest A320neo overall (7 years in May 2024) — that came from Icelandic carrier WOW air shortly after its collapse in March 2019, which itself came barely weeks before the collapse of Jet Airways, India’s premier full-service airline, in April. (Vistara’s other all-economy A320neos — VT-TNL/TNM and the VT-TY* series — were all delivered new to the airline.) While the catering on such a short hop was not the best, I’d been more than happy that I could finally tick the Vistara box off before 2022 ended.
Not to mention, before that 2022 flight, I’d purchased access to the magnificent 080 Domestic Lounge in Bengaluru’s Terminal 1. I must say it had absolutely blown me away in terms of both décor and buffet selection, and it sets a very high bar for Indian airport lounges, domestic or otherwise. In contrast, the Adani Lounge on this sector was great in theory, but the excessive crowding is a major caveat to note. In fairness, the blame for that goes for Indian credit-card issuers, as people have been snapping those up left, right and centre, and I feel the time has come to tighten access requirements — much like Delta Sky Clubs in the US. Anyway, with all that backstory aside, let’s start this story at midnight on Christmas Eve!
But before that…
Saturday, 23 December, afternoon. Before heading to Changi Airport on Saturday evening, I noticed that I’d been hit throughout the week by a barrage of emails from Vistara. One of them promoted ‘extra services’ (yes, in quotes; I don’t think that was deliberate or ironic); another advertised its eponymous inflight magazine, with this month’s edition being ‘The Celebrations Issue’. More of them were for domestic fare sales, including a Christmas sale, as well as for the Club Vistara programme.
Talk about screaming in your face!
I did have a service to buy from them, though, and that was for 5 kg excess baggage. Indian domestic flights in economy almost always limit you to 15 kg per passenger, often with the additional limitation of only 1 piece, so this was something I simply had to buy.
Resuming reportage at Ground Zero — the ground floor
Sunday, 24 December, midnight. Just outside the T2 arrivals, after having a midnight-snack-of-sorts at an expensive Starbucks (see the previous report’s Travelling Bonus for the details), I headed to the lift lobbies with at least a dozen parking floors. Each elevator was big enough to hold at least seven people and two luggage-filled trolleys, and I took them all the way up to the departures level where a Burger King sat.
The place was brimming with people sending their loved ones off on late-night journeys, with names as far-flung as Kenya Airways, Ethiopian Airlines and VietJetAir all in one gate.
The terminal had been inaugurated back in January 2014, so it was nearing the decade mark.
For the record, the Prime Minister who did so belonged to the Indian National Congress, which was voted out of power the same year by Narendra Modi and his conservative Bharatiya Janata Party, which has remained in power ever since. (And will continue to do so, since the ongoing General Assembly (Lok Sabha) elections in April–May 2024 are set to be won by the BJP by a landslide.) Anyway…
Next to the gates, which were festooned with red-and-green Season’s Greetings decorations, throngs and throngs of passengers continued to line up and get dropped off by their vehicles. A number of other airlines from near and far were also present, some African airlines (other than KQ and ET above) among them, from Air Mauritius to RwandAir — the latter of which terminated flights to Mumbai in March 2024.
People jostled and shoved to enter the security-manned gates, and — as I noted in a photo caption — an aged grandmother on a wheelchair was pushed by a little girl.
Many Middle Eastern airlines were also departing within the next few hours, from big names like Etihad and Saudia to smaller ones like Iraqi Airways, as I’ll get into below. The self-check-in counters didn’t quite work for my Vistara flight as they did for another passenger’s IndiGo flight, so in I had to go.
Once inside, the first thing that struck me (other than BOM’s distinctive tall pillars with square-pixel lettering) was… well, scroll a bit further to find out. (Hint: you see both old and new logos in the below set of pictures.)
Air India had only just started to implement its new brand image — unveiled in August with much fanfare — on the ground and on its website and social media, and now I got to see it firsthand at one of its major international hubs. My word, it was very impressive indeed, and knocked my socks off — that’s what the Tata Group, along with Futrebrand, had pulled off!
From the Namaste sign with a picture of the Bandra–Worli Sea Link, to the cream colour for First Class and the deep burgundy for Business, coupled with the sleek extended sans-serif font, this was leaps and bounds ahead of whatever was there before. In contrast, the nearby British Airways desks were a little too blue (literally and metaphorically) by comparison, and the lone Iraqi Airways desk (IA442 to Baghdad via Najaf) had an ancient, if classic, logo.
All the rich, glossy red on the AI signage (not to mention the HSBC banners above) twinned with the Vista motif was a treat to behold, and it shows just how drastic and top-to-bottom Air India’s transformation has been. I do wish, though, that AI had stuck to a single custom font — like Saudia did with its own rebrand a couple of months later — instead of also choosing the common and overused Nunito, a free Google Font.
Further beyond were countless check-in desks for other airlines, ranging from Air Mauritius (as above) to Air France–KLM, with Vistara’s international desks next to them. There was also a booth with a cutout of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, with the hashtag #BharatKiUdan (Flight of India) in front of an old-fashioned security screening setup.
Also (second row below) was a sign that said: A short walk will take you to the 11th century, advertising…
…the Jaya He GVK New Museum, one of the largest and most exotic ‘art museums’ in the country, which in fact spans the length and breadth of the terminal across three levels. This New York Times article has the lowdown on how such an intricate, rich exhibition of art and heritage could be woven into a major international airport.
(GVK was the previous operator of both BOM and BLR airports until the late 2010s, after which the former was sold to the Adani Group and the latter to a consortium led by Fairfax Partners.)
I decided to write a couple of captions in Hindi to capture my experience with the new Air India brand. (I speak Bengali only to my family; it’s either Hindi or Tamil to other Indians, depending on the situation.)
1. The Hindi sentence reads: A bed can be made anywhere… in a hotel or on the departure seat.
2. Reads: Didn’t the Futurebrand magic work? The new Air India brand is all around us. And we are trying to sleep amidst that.
At one point I also compared my lot (meaning fate) to a young colleague around my age, who just a day ago had to fly from Singapore to Mumbai to Bengaluru to Hubballi, the last on an ATR 72. This was to attend her elder brother’s engagement — all of it in rock-hard IndiGo economy, instead of the SQ A380 and Vistara A320neo that I was flying for the first two of those legs. (That note is too private to post here.)
Ethiopian, Africa’s largest airline — which I’d flown twice in 2023 on the one-hour hop between Singapore and Kuala Lumpur — occupied a fair share of real estate. Not far from this ’Emirates of Africa’ was the actual Emirates itself, one of at least a dozen Middle Eastern carriers here…
…many of which were low-cost operators like Air Arabia (UAE), Jazeera (Kuwait) and flynas (Saudi Arabia), which stood alongside a whole row of desks for the local giant, IndiGo, for its own Middle Eastern network.
At the far left end of the terminal were desks for Singapore Airlines — which I flew from BOM two months later on its A350, connecting from the Air India A350 from BLR — and beside that were even more airlines from between India and Europe: Etihad, Saudia (also with a new logo) and Turkish. (Okay, Turkish isn’t Middle Eastern — it’s more European — but its size and global reach of destinations are much more on par with Emirates and Qatar. Etihad and Saudia are much smaller in terms of scale.)
I was tired after roaming around with my bags and luggage at one in the morning, so decided to drift off for half an hour or so. Then I was feeling thirsty, and fortunately there were some stalls for parched throats: Street Foods by Punjab Grill, Fresc Co Café, New York Burrito. From the last of these I bought a mint-cucumber lemonade: a somewhat pricey one, at ₹149 INR, but it did the trick.
Then came even more international airlines: some more from the Gulf, like Oman Air and flydubai, and others from Europe, like Star Alliance co-founders Lufthansa and Air Canada. (Yes, the Air Canada flight came from Europe: AC855/856 is a seasonal service during the winter months, flying between Toronto and Mumbai via London Heathrow. In the summer months, however, the LHR–BOM leg is not operated, only YYZ–LHR.)
There was also my favourite, beloved SriLankan Airlines, which has to fight to keep its small 20-odd fleet in the air while providing the best of beautiful Sri Lankan hospitality.
Further left were these exquisitely shaped lounging areas that overlooked the departure gates, and they buzzed with perhaps more activity at two in the morning than they would at two in the afternoon, when almost all the international departures give way to domestic ones!
This caption is self-explanatory. Much as BKK’s mind-boggling range of airlines from Russia, Central Asia, Africa and smaller East Asian countries is second to none, its ugly, drab, industrial appearance is nowhere near the picture of beauty that private Indian airports like BOM and BLR are.
Yet more hoardings and billboards, including some more heritage exhibits, and a couple of ads for state-owned banks (Union Bank of India and Bank of Baroda); finally a Dyson-sponsored eco-initiative in the restrooms for the conservation of paper.
My phone battery and I were both exhausted and down for the count, so I briefly considered having another drink top-up from a nearby Baker Street café, but thought the better of it. It was nearing 2:30, when Vistara’s domestic check-in desks opened, and I headed there instead.
There was barely anyone in the queue, so it didn’t take too long for the boarding pass to be issued. I was shocked to find that the top of the pass being issued was a dark metallic blue, and not the signature dark Qatar Airways-esque purple of the airline. Sheetal, the check-in agent, confirmed my hunch: ‘Sir, aapko complimentary upgrade kiya gaya hai (you have been given a complimentary upgrade) to Premium Economy.’ WHAT?!?! I could scarcely believe her words and my eyes.
This was perhaps the best shock I’ve ever received on an Indian domestic flight! I twisted and twirled the purple-on-the-back boarding pass, and almost did a cartwheel in jubilation. First, one of the newest planes flying in India today, and now this?! 😲
On I skipped to the security screening, where — for the first time ever on an Indian domestic flight (at least as far as I can remember) — not a single bag was flagged for re-checking. As if the Christmas decorations weren’t special enough!
Nearby was an adorable series of ads for the Indian engineering company Kirloskar, which had rebranded with a new logo and identity a couple of years before, in July 2021. Kids express their wishful thoughts, from flying shoes, to magic pencils, to apps for speaking to dogs — cute (if fanciful) indeed!
Meanwhile, celebrated cricketer Virat Kohli was endorsing the HSBC Premier credit card — another of the country’s innumerable celebrity endorsements — as I went down to T2’s domestic departures. This is perhaps the best domestic departure terminal (beating DEL T3 and even BLR T1/T2 in some areas) I’ve ever seen in any country, with endless shops and restaurants.
Take that, Changi! An airport can feel luxurious even without Louis Vuitton, Dior, Chanel and Gucci boutiques, and BOM T2 proves it.
More celebrity endorsements awaited me on the lower floor: as you see above, Sachin Tendulkar, the ‘God of Cricket’, for Tanishq jewellery, and acting veteran Amitabh Bachchan and Hrithik Roshan for APL Apollo steel pipes. Below, a whole garden wall for the young pair of Kiara Advani and Vijay Deverakonda for Cera bathroom fittings. And that doesn’t even take into account those at the arrival gates: Anushka Sharma (Michael Kors), Kriti Sanon and Varun Dhawan (Fossil watches), Rashmika Mandanna (Kalyan Jewellers)… phew!
For comparison, is there an airport where Nicole Kidman, Anne Hathaway, Gal Gadot and Leonardo DiCaprio occupy every visible inch of real estate? No, right?
Just two more celebrities coming up, I promise! Hrithik Roshan for Simpolo shirts, and Kriti Sanon for Motorola smartphones just behind that. Never mind that it was past three in the morning, but the area looked as plush and opulent as ever, with apparel, beauty, gastronomy, gifts and travel all taken care of. Heck, I wonder if this is actually an airport or a lavish, luxe shopping plaza!
Even at that ungodly hour, there were a few people milling about the eateries before catching their early-morning departures, of which a good percentage were to either Delhi or Bengaluru. Oh how I love this place. And how I wish I could live here: in Mumbai, that is! (I bet the upcoming Navi Mumbai airport will take things up a notch even further in the luxury department.)
I popped into Reliance Digital, an electronics store. Ordinarily such stores are packed with 4K TVs, fridges, air-conditioners and computers, but for this airport location the gadgets were all portable. They ranged from phones to smart speakers to power banks to travel gear to Amazon’s Fire TV Stick and Echo (Show) — as the last one’s Indianised packaging was proof of.
I bought a wall charger and a power bank, but while the former serves me to this day, I lost the latter in a couple of days. In fact this trend would be repeated throughout my next few days in Vietnam, where I bought and lost at least three power banks — only managing to hold on to a fourth! (First-world problems…)
I walked on a bit more, past the food court and the bar (and another Starbucks), and came to the opposite side where a bookstore stood.
Not WHSmith, nor Relay, but a product unique to Mumbai: Bookscetra was where I’d bought a couple of books on my previous visit to BOM T2 in March 2023. This time, too, would be no different, as actor Huma S. Qureshi had released a book called Zeba: An Accidental Superhero, published by HarperCollins. And of course I had to purchase it! (Which I did further down below.)
Extending beyond, along the corridors to the gates, were ornate artworks flanking the walls — along with ads for Volkswagen and other brands.
At three-thirty, I headed down to the Travel Club Lounge near Gate 44, as that was the one listed on the Priority Pass app. Turns out it wasn’t accepting customers, redirecting them to the nearby Adani Lounge instead… and, as the pictures below show, the queues to enter that one were absolutely crazy at that otherwise sleepy time of day. I don’t envy the poor lounge reps who had to check each passenger’s details and let him or her through.
From those flying in Business Class, to those being granted lounge access through their credit cards (like me, which I suspect was the majority), to those who were just paying to enter, the throngs of people created an ambience I’d never expected to see at a premium lounge. Certainly not so late in the night!
Once inside, though, I was surrounded by blindingly brilliant white lights, lush vegetation on the walls, intricately carved murals… and above all a bunch of people lounging around, some sleeping, others chatting or scolling through their phones. Out the window were the planes — almost all from the A320 family — that were resting the night here.
In stark contrast, the Chase Sapphire Lounge at HKG three days later (also via Priority Pass) was a complete oasis of calm, and a most spacious and airy one at that. But I’ll probably take closed setups like these over such high-ceilinged spaces, not least because I have a high-ceiling phobia!
I WhatsApped my parents, saying, ‘Somehow I only just managed to enter the lounge; the crowds are insane!’ But it was all so worth it: flying the A380 to Mumbai, then getting to relax in a premium lounge — my world had expanded so much in 2023 alone, and this was the perfect way to finish it!
I looked at Google Maps, and pinched myself hard: I really was in Mumbai, the country’s hub of finance, trade and entertainment! While BOM is a perennially congested place, it’s easily among my top five globally in terms of aesthetics, but I fully expect the new Navi Mumbai airport to beat it — as hard an ask that is (especially with a whole museum built into this one’s corridors) — when it comes up.
I dozed off for a while, allowing my nearly-depleted phone to recharge its battery while I did mine. When I woke up it was 5:40 and time for breakfast. I’d have to rush, or I risked missing my flight to Bengaluru, so off I went to the sumptuous buffet spread.
And my gosh, they sure did an awesome job with the aesthetics — it looked no less than a five-star Taj or Hyatt, with subtle Indian touches!
As Ben from OMAAT typically says in this scenario, I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves. In addition to the enviable spread of fast-breaking items, there were also a couple of donation boxes for childhood malnutrition placed at certain junctures.
I wound up with a plate of some fruits, some carbs and a dessert, with a glass of orange juice nearly toppling the whole thing over, which I then carried back to my seat. I gobbled it all up and took a moment to breathe.
These, for the record, were the details of my aircraft, which I proudly shared with my parents. Some other interesting departures included an Air India 787 in the Gandhi livery; a Kenya Airways 737 which had been spending the night; and a LOT Polish Airlines 787-8, which I caught on the taxi out an hour later.
There was also a 747 of China Airlines Cargo; there are no passenger flights between Taiwan and India, and I doubt EVA or Starlux will launch flights to DEL or BOM any time soon.
Breakfast done, I dashed out of the place at the stroke of six, and headed straight to the Bookscetra store, where I collected a copy of the book by Huma S. Qureshi. (She usually calls herself just Huma Qureshi, but had to add that initial to avoid confusion with a British author of the same name.)
I barely had time to snap-snap-snap the glamorous terminal shops again, but I did anyway, and it’s a wonder I managed to do so.
Then began the sprint to Gate 87, with a long row of mostly Vistara but also 6E A320/1neos along the way… not to mention these ornate, detailed decorations adorning the entire passage, with pretty lotus-shaped chandeliers above.
In some respects I even prefer this to BLR T2, even though the latter has swept a number of awards — including the UNESCO’s Prix Versailles (Special Prize for an Interior) — along the way, which it most definitely deserves. Anything that isn’t as woefully mismanaged and lacklustre as my previous Indian home airport of Chennai (MAA) will do, and if it’s BOM or BLR, so much the better.
And then, at a quarter past six, I reached Gate 87 where it was, once again, Final Call. How many times have I boarded a plane in 2023 alone just as the doors are about to close?! Anyway, I wended my way through the TotalEnergies-branded jetbridge, bringing my lovely, memorable stay at Mumbai to an end for the time being.
Surprised, I noted that even the woman ahead of me had — judging by the boarding pass she carried — been upgraded to Premium Economy! What an awesome feeling to have, as Tango Quebec Tango awaited my entry. This may well have been the final time on the purple-and-gold tail, but seeing Air India’s new livery on an A320neo — hopefully with seatback IFE in the coming years — should make up for it!
Flight: Vistara UK851/VTI851
Date: Sunday, 24 December 2023
Route: Mumbai Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj (VABB/BOM) to Bengaluru Kempegowda (VOBL/BLR)
Aircraft: VT-TQT, Airbus A320neo
Age: Just 1 month at the time! (built: 11 November 2023, delivered: 7 December 2023)
Seat: 3C (port side, aisle), changed to 3B (port side, middle)
Boarding: 6:15am IST (GMT +5:30)
Departure: 7:31am IST
Arrival: 8:46am IST
Duration: 1 hour 15 minutes
Notes:
• Third flight on Vistara, after UK893 BLR–HYD (all-economy A320neo VT-TNN) in December 2022, and UK106 SIN–BOM (A321neo VT-TVE with special ’50 Aircraft Strong’ sticker) in March 2023. Probably the final Vistara flight before it merges with Air India.
• First-ever flight in a class higher than Economy, courtesy a completely unexpected upgrade.
• First flight on an aircraft less than a month old, which had only entered service a week ago!
Mistletoes and baubles on the bulkhead, and magazines in the (seat) pocket
I don’t usually like sitting at the bulkhead; in fact, let me go on record to say that I would never have chosen this seat for myself. I strongly prefer having as many rows as possible in front of me, which is why I sit at the rear of the aircraft — in Row 66 and above if possible, and in a K-seat by the window, as my past SQ 787, A350 and A380 reviews show.
But you don’t nitpick when you’ve been given a FREE upgrade, and I most certainly wasn’t! As with parent SQ, there were a few mistletoe-and-bauble decorations placed on the bulkheads, while I settled into my aisle seat and began browsing through the safety card, entertainment connection guide and — yes — inflight magazine.
In fact, I must say that of the five airlines I flew on this trip, SQ was the only one without a magazine! Vistara has an eponymous magazine, and so does Cathay; VietJetAir’s is called One2fly, while Vietnam Airlines has two — Heritage and Heritage Fashion — which seems a bit redundant. More airlines across the world are reintroducing their physical inflight magazines, but SQ (plus the likes of EK and QR) remain firm holdouts. RIP, SilverKris!
In any case, as is the norm for Indian inflight magazines, most of the articles were on far-flung destinations, including many not served by the airline but rather through its codeshare partners. This was complemented by a number of ads, found across almost every second page, and this was definitely one of the more ad-filled inflight publications I’ve seen.
Also worth noting: Indian airlines (IndiGo and Vistara in particular) love to highlight the positive feedback they receive through social media in their magazines, and I bet AI has jumped in on this with its rejuvenated Namaste.AI magazine.
The ‘meat’ of the magazine, to me, was at the back, and one spread showcased the Christmastime movie picks of the month. Many other (largely Indian) movies and shows were on offer, but to truly take advantage of them you’d need to be flying on the A321neo or 787-9 with seatback IFE, and not the A320neo where a glare-ridden iPad is the best you could get.
Another spread highlighted an array of special services — which were also in the email up top — and then came the routemap and feedback form. (Note that almost all of Vistara’s international routes are from either DEL or BOM, with the exception of Pune (PNQ) to Singapore, with nothing from BLR or other cities.)
Flight attendant Mahitha was serving the folks in Business, handing out hot towels like they did on my previous SQ A380 flight. Complementing her was Rupsha, who would do the bulk of the service on this side of the curtains. I noted that those up front in J* enjoyed complimentary drinks and printed menus, but little did I know that I, in Premium Economy, would be getting them myself!
*For the uninitiated, J is avgeek shorthand for Business Class.
And lo and behold! A breakfast menu card was handed out by Rupsha, and it sure looked dainty with the logo motif pattern and the Scene font. There were three options: one Western non-veg (Three Pepper Frittata) and the other two vegetarian — North Indian (Pindi Chole with Masala Kulche) and South Indian (Tomato Upma with Keerai Vada) — and I went with the Western dish as per my father’s advice. In contrast, on my AI A350 flight two months later in the opposite direction, I chose the South Indian choice and relished it!
I might also add that the PA system was playing rather ye-olde Christmas songs, and that the lead flight attendant’s name (I barely had time to read her badge) was something like Teisulenma — definitely a Northeast Indian name. I got the correct spelling on leaving, though!
Now an IndiGo-operated Turkish Airlines 777-300ER (TC-LKE) had lifted off for Istanbul, followed shortly by TK’s own 777-300ER (TC-LKC) and a motley of others. On the taxi out, I’d see some Star Alliance 787s, namely the ET 787-9 and the LOT 787-8, as well as the Kenya 737.
There were plenty of late-nighters from the Middle East (as you see above and below), including A320neos from Gulf Air, both Kuwaiti airlines (Jazeera and Kuwait Airways) and also flynas from both Riyadh and Dammam. There were also the Emirates A380, flydubai 737-800 and Etihad 787-9, not to mention EY’s A350-1000 that had arrived the previous day and which I’d managed to spot.
In addition, there was an all-white A330 from Egyptair — not something you see every day! The Star Alliance’s only Arabic member has passenger flights to DEL (MS974/975) on the A320neo and BOM (MS968/969) on the 737-800, in addition to a cargo flight (MS518/519) to BOM on the A330-200. At first I thought this was a freighter, given the absence of Egyptair titles, but nope!
There were a whole bunch of exotic aircraft at this airport that might otherwise be mistaken for an IndiGo-, AI- and Vistara-filled place with a lack of variety. Kicking off the proceedings at the next gate was VT-TYC, an all-economy company A320neo, as well as the grounded Go First’s VT-WGD. ‘Poor VT-WGD in the distance; will she ever fly again?’ I noted.
I wonder if that airline’s planes will ever fly again for a different operator. It’s exactly a year before the day of publishing this report that G8 collapsed, and its likelihood of returning is as near-zero as Jet Airways’.
My own A320neo had shown up on the Flightradar24 map, and close by was a brand-new Air India A320neo (VT-RTP) headed for the new Hirasar (HSR) airport serving Rajkot in the western state of Gujarat. All AI A320neos delivered until March 2024 — accounting for most of the VT-RT* series — feature the old livery, but VT-RTN is set to be the first in the new colours.
As the manual safety demo was performed, we taxied past the Kenya Airways 737-800 (5Y-CYC) and the Ethiopian 787-9 (ET-AXK), followed by the LOT Polish 787-8 (SP-LRC) further down, which was mostly obscured by a 6E A320neo.
Please pardon the angles; this was the best I could get from an aisle seat, though my neighbour traded his middle seat so that I could get better photos.
Here were some angles from the other side, with ET-AXK behind. Funnily enough this 787-9 was recently (late April 2024) embroiled in a controversy, when on landing at Beirut Airport, Lebanese authorities ordered the ‘Tel Aviv’ name on its rear to be covered up!
Besides the ET and LO 787s, we also passed by an AI 787-8 (VT-ANQ) with an Ek Onkar symbol — associated with Sikhism — on the tail, which looks quite similar at a distance to VT-ANP with the Mohandas Gandhi decal. Another 787-8 visible, this time from Oneworld, was British Airways’ G-ZBJH.
Now the TK 777-300ER (TC-LKC) was all ready for departure, and she blasted off ahead of us into a glorious sunrise ahead of us. Also present was ES-SAF, a SmartLynx Estonia A320 operating for 6E with only the bare IndiGo titles and no other paint.
As the TK 777 rocketed away, I noted the graciousness of the uncle in the middle seat, who kindly gave up his place on knowing that I was an avid avgeek and planespotter!
At half-past seven it was our own turn to roar up and away. With the 9W A330 graveyard in the distance, and an AI 747 closer by — VT-EVA was given a special sendoff in April 2024 as this Queen flew away to the US — I bid this marvellous, mad, magnificent metropolitan megacity farewell, only to return here two months later!
BOM, and Mumbai as a whole, receded further into the distance and became a tiny speck as the rising sun shone brightly above the clouds, while Mahitha and Rupsha commenced with their service in Business and Premium Economy respectively, both sets of curtains (J–PY and PY–Y) drawn.
With a quiet smile, Rupsha placed a whole load of food on my tray table, much more than I’d bargained for! The main breakfast dish itself was an egg frittata (a.k.a. plane omelette) with a chicken sausage and a tomato salad, but the real stars of the show were everything else that went with it.
Cut fruits, a bottle of Aava water, a bottle of Bombay Banta masala lemonade (sweet and refreshing!) a simple but pretty cup of Sprite, metal cutlery wrapped in a branded tissue and ribbon, the obligatory dry croissant and Amul butter… the whole thing reminded me of Jet Airways in its heyday, and of a time where cost-cutting was not the name of the game. IndiGo’s outright refusal, in many cases, to serve even a sandwich — forget about anything hot — on board has brought the Indian traveller to such a point that such a setup on Vistara looks absolutely lavish by comparison.
And this is on an Indian domestic sector! How about the one-hour hops from Dubai to Riyadh, or Muscat, or Kuwait? Or Singapore to Jakarta or Kuala Lumpur? How pampered must those folks be for a breakfast service? This was all-around a great meal, even though a generic one, and wasn’t let down as on my other two meals on Vistara: the dry snack in December 2022 and the terrible dessert in March 2023 that thankfully did not derail a superb main course.
After Rupsha was done, she retreated into the galley, not that I needed any interaction with the cabin crew to begin with; I was more than content with Anjira’s service on the preceding SQ A380. I connected to the Vistara World network and settled in, not that I’d watch anything on a 90-minute sector.
Truth be told, the UI could do with a refresh, and being ranked the 20th-best entertainment system in the world is not exactly something you should boast of! There was a whole bunch of Indian movies and shows, plus some Western ones, not to mention the airline’s own promotional (especially wellness) videos. But the moving map, unlike in December 2022 to Hyderabad, had gone kaput.
I went for the soundtrack of Jawan, the year’s biggest blockbuster, which I’ve mentioned in some previous reports. Popular Tamil composer Anirudh Ravichander, for the first time, produced a Bollywood playlist, and this (particularly the energising Jawan Title Track and the high-octane Zinda Banda) would be powering me throughout the final days of 2023 — especially at HKG, and in the Chase Sapphire Lounge there.
The next order of business, of course — with less than half an hour into the flight — was to crazily dash off my journal entry for the flight, chronicling my escapades into the night and highlighting the Premium Economy upgrade, the insane lounge queue and the flight itself.
At 8:46 — the same flight number as Vistara’s BLR–BOM early-morning A321neo sector — VT-TQT touched down at Kempegowda International Airport, a place that I will always be proud to have called my Indian home airport, even if only for a year or two.
Never mind that BLR is much higher-altitude (and hence colder) than Chennai, my previous home city by the sea — not to mention much further from the city centre. When you have one of the world’s newest and most-awarded terminals, instead of MAA’s brand-new but still mismanaged government-run facility, everything is forgiven.
The proportion of non-VT aircraft is definitely much lower at BLR than at BOM or DEL, since you won’t have Kenya or LOT flying here, even though the likes of Ethiopian, JAL and Qantas do — and so does Virgin Atlantic from April 2024. Still, there were a couple of foreign visitors, including an Oman Air 737 MAX and an EK 777.
The most noteworthy Indian plane was the Vistara 787-9, which usually flies from either BOM or DEL to LHR/CDG/FRA, and hence is not normally seen at BLR.
Besides another IndiGo/SmartLyx A320 and an ancient Blue Dart 757, I managed to spot Vistara’s 787-9 VT-TSH resting, as well as 6E A321neos VT-IMC — I flew this plane on the exact same day that BLR T2 opened for international operations — and VT-IBJ. An EK 777-300ER (A6-ENE) had also landed by now, and was faintly visible in the distance amidst the haze.
I bid Rupsha farewell, not that there was all that much to say, and finally figured out the name of the lead cabin crew from the Northeast. Her name was Tem-sui-en-la — what a mouthful!
Thanks for the ride, VT-TQT! I stepped out of the unbranded jetbridge amid the cold morning sunshine, and into the terminal, which was trying to give BOM T2 a run for its money in terms of the number of artworks it had.
While BOM’ T2s décor was more white with lighter tones of brown, BLR had gone for more earthy, wooden shades. What hadn’t changed was the billboards, but there weren’t as many celebrities here as there were in Bollywood town. Those that were included Kriti Sanon for Motorola (also seen at BOM) and a pair of A-list actresses for Malabar Gold & Diamonds: Alia Bhatt, 31, and Kareena Kapoor Khan, 43.
Then came the corridors leading to baggage claim, and they were as spic-and-span as could be. Kriti Sanon showed herself once again, this time in Varun Dhawan’s company, in another Fossil ad, above which towered the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip5 and Fold5. I doubt that many celebs are buying Samsungs, when almost everyone even remotely connected with the influencer world uses iPhone Pros.
As someone with a phobia of high ceilings, I appreciate that BLR’s baggage-belt areas (both DOM and INT) are not too towering while still being airy — much like Changi T2, but not T3. The whole place was a picture of understated opulence, with much quieter décor than BOM’s ornate, intricate sculptures and artworks. While I do prefer BOM T2’s lotus-shaped chandeliers, the brass bells at BLR do lend an earthy touch, and are both luxurious and eco-friendly to boot.
As if The Archies (see previous report’s Travelling Bonus) weren’t enough, Netflix was releasing another film that month featuring Bollywood star kids (or ’nepo-kids’), notably Ananya Panday.
VT-TNN, the first UK A320neo that I’d flown nearly a year before, was landing from Goa’s older Dabolim (GOI) airport as against the spanking-new Manohar (GOX) airport in the far north of India’s smallest state. A Saudia A330-300 (HZ-AQJ) had also landed, as SV866 from Jeddah. Like AI, SV hasn’t done a great job repainting its existing planes into the new livery, with mostly the latest A321neos (HZ-ASA* series) sporting the new retro-futuristic colour scheme.
I spotted a glimpse of the bright new Air India Express brand at the baggage assistance counters, and it was a great irony that AI still showed its old logo there. In fairness, it was only a few days ago that AI had started rolling out its new brand at physical locations, with it being a largely theoretical concept from its launch in August until December.
A standing banner with a QR code had been placed to promote National Geographic India’s Superstructures documentary on the making of BLR T2, which had premiered that very week. A 080 Transit Hotel was under construction, and if it’s anywhere as luxurious as the one I’d stayed at (in BLR T1) in June 2022, I’ll be a very happy camper!
At long last, I was out into the lamp-lit arrivals corridor of BLR T2, and it was definitely a much quieter place than the equivalent in Mumbai, which was teeming with people — like everything in that manic city. Without further ado, I headed away from all the eateries and towards the Ola and Uber pick-up zone.
When going from Kempegowda — which is located in the far northeast of the city — to the southern fringes of Bengaluru where my parents stay, the Uber fare invariably crosses ₹1,200 (US$15) on the best of days. The 47-km distance is bad enough, compounded by the traffic that can catch you unawares on a bad day, leading to travel times of beyond 2 hours at worst — as long as it takes to fly to Delhi!
In no time, the car was speeding out past the high-speed highways, past ads for the new Kia Sonet, past ’Newphoria’ ads for the iPhone 15, and into the gridlock of India’s third-largest city.
Our love for pretty ladies on billboards does not seem to be abating any time soon, and I soon saw a number of smaller jewellers like Kushal’s and PMJ — as opposed to big multinational names like Tanishq, Malabar and Kalyan — and ethnicwear companies like Taruni. Moreover, veteran ex-cricketer Rahul Dravid graced another billboard for a budget hotel chain that said, simply, ‘Welcome to BLR’.
Ah, the homely feeling of Indian billboards with Indian faces! Be it a Sensodyne toothpaste ad with a white kurta-clad girl wincing in pain from an ice-cream bite, or a Bacardi ad (fourth row, right) with the festive spirit, or even an Air India hoarding (with the old logo) promoting nonstop services to San Francisco, Singapore and the Maldives…
The feeling of having come to my homeland only just gets started with all these billboards, which you’ll never see in Singapore.
Eventually, long after reaching home, I noticed these packets of aftermint and creamer/sugar from the flight, tied so neatly with the thick golden thread. I suppose that’s the attention to detail I received with that breakfast service!
Now, in and of itself, this was one of those ordinary flights with polite, friendly but ultimately forgettable service. I probably won’t remember Rupsha, or even Mahitha, much less Temsuienla with that tongue-twisting name of hers, as I will remember the caring hand of Prajna on IndiGo in September 2023, or the rockstars on the Air India A319 in March. Neither was the Vistara World streaming IFE particularly memorable, certainly not compared to the stellar product — including the Panasonic Arc moving-map system — on the UK A321neo. But those are minor, trivial things.
When the Indian flying public as a whole has been so accustomed to IndiGo’s entertainment-less, almost meal-less product, with only a magazine and cheerful cabin girls for company, what Vistara has been doing — and AI needs to carry on after they merge — is a very welcome change indeed. No, this isn’t SriLankan’s delightful, tiny fleet of A320-family planes, both new and old, all of which are equipped with seatback IFE. Nor is this the Vistara A321neo with flat beds, seatback IFE and Wi-Fi.
But you must remember that UK was the airline that pioneered Premium Economy in India, and I was happy to have finally got a taste of it — that too for free! So extensive was the breakfast presentation — replete with a menu card and a whole set of accompaniments — that you can only hope that this is the direction that AI will take on its narrowbodies going forward. If the ongoing domestic A350 flights (which I’ve taken) are any indication, AI will definitely go the extra mile in differentiating itself from 6E’s bare-bones product. Then again, with 6E ordering 30 A350s in April 2024, you can never tell whether they might actually play with the idea of a premium offering!
As for the airports, I’m well and truly spoiled that I’m able to call one of Asia’s most dazzling (and awarded) new airport terminals — BLR T2 — my home, and equally spoiled to be flying from a terminal as glamorous, richly designed and packed with Indian culture as BOM T2. Those in India’s smaller cities, or those with government-run airports like Chennai (my former home) and Kolkata (my birthplace), will continue to miss out on the action that the country’s newest airports — North Goa or the upcoming Noida or Navi Mumbai, among others — continue to get. At the end of the day, while I do have a soft spot for KLIA and also Denpasar, and while I’m very fortunate to be based out of Singapore Changi — always the best in the world (outside Qatar, that is!) — the posh facilities in my motherland are second to none. While insanely crowded, the décor and food of the Adani Lounge (rated above as the GVK Lounge) only reinforced my firm belief that few airports, to me, on the planet get it much better than BOM T2 in terms of aesthetics.
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And that’s it for the India portion of the Christmas/New Year trip! Next will be a bunch of flights to unknown, unexplored places, with an eerie sense of excitement… and nowhere was this more evident than the Cathay Pacific A350 from BLR to HKG three days later, where everything was so new, so unfamiliar to even a hardened traveller like me. But if the A350 was so alien (and yet CX’s brand is so polished and perfect), the spiffy CX A321neo, with a crystal-sharp 4K screen, that took me to Hanoi later that evening made the Oneworld airline feel like a new friend and the start of a new relationship.
As I’ve always maintained, this alliance’s members are always a notch better than the rest in terms of typography and brand — be it Qantas, Finnair, Malaysia or Iberia — but CX is the very best of them all. Especially as every other Northeast Asian airline is either inconsistent or at worst downright awful with brand consistency, worse by miles than Western, Gulf or even Indian airlines. (Yes, that includes its alliance partner JAL, which now has perhaps the world’s best first class on the A350-1000!) That doesn’t even start to get at the planespotting paradise that is HKG, and the phenomenal Sky Bridge and Intervals Bar, and the otherworldly Chase Sapphire Lounge… and that’s what you’re going to read about next, before we land in Vietnam for the final flights (on VietJetAir and Vietnam Airlines) of 2023!
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