Can a boy who grew up in a remote village and went from riding a bullock cart go onto owning an airline, one that would become India’s first and largest low-cost carrier? Yes, it is possible in the New India, where opportunities abound! Passion, Grit, Hard work and a bit of luck is all what it takes – not millions of dollars or crores of rupees. That’s the message coming out from SIMPLY FLY, A Deccan Odyssey, a book by Capt Gopinath, the man who revolutionized Indian airline industry with its low-cost Air Deccan for common man.
The 380 page thick tome offers an inspirational read to those willing to soar. The book traces Capt Gopinath’s journey from being an Army man, to a village farmer, to starting an airline and then selling it off to Vijay Mallya – only to turn entrepreneur again with his latest venture Deccan 360!
When the young Gopinath quit the Indian Army in the late 1970s with a gratuity of just Rs 6,500, he returned to his family and his village in Karnataka. He then set about converting a piece of barren land into a farm for silkworm rearing, and ended up winning the Rolex award for it. A series of business ventures followed, but his passion and steely determination saw him steer each one to success. His biggest business venture, however, was Air Deccan. Through it, he made it possible for the common man to fly. Investors approved, and the market cap shot up to $1.1 billion in just four years, in the process rewriting aviation history in India.
Simply Fly is not just an entrepreneurial journey. It is a story of triumph over adversity -- a tale that can inspire all of us.
Talking about the book, Nandan Nilekani, Chairman, Unique Identification Authority of India says: “Capt. Gopinath is an intrepid and irrepressible entrepreneur with an incredible flair for story-telling. And what a story! An Army man turned farmer who enabled the common man to fly. Full of an earthy wisdom and gentle humour, this book is also a discovery of the difficulties and the exhilaration that innovative entrepreneurs face in India.”
In his foreword, Capt Gopinath writes, “This 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.”
He adds, “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. Turmoil, 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.”
The book offers a firsthand account of the negotiation Capt Gopinath had with Liquor baron Vijay Mallya. Remembering his first meeting, Capt Gopinath writes, “Vijay Mallya welcomed me and straightaway offered me a drink. I settled for a beer, which was promptly served. Vijay Mallya is an affable and very hospitable person. He uses his carefully engineered pug image as a front. He came straight to the point with no preliminaries. He said, ‘Gopi, you are from Bengaluru. I am from Bengaluru. Why do we need two airlines?’ I promptly replied, ‘Vijay, we are very different as individuals. We have different philosophies, outlooks on life, and styles of functioning. How would it help to erase our individual borderlines and identities?’ He suggested working together as one airline so as to avoid eating into each other’s market share. He said he would like to invest in my airline. No word-mincer, Vijay spoke as if he wanted to buy me out. He would call the new airline Kingfisher Airlines. I said, ‘Yes, ‘it’s not a bad idea, but I need to think about it. If we can’t make a single airline through your investment in Deccan, I am sure we could collaborate. We could share our engineering and other resources.”
SIMPLY FLY, published by Collins Business books, is a good read for budding entrepreneurs to get a ringside and a passionate view of building successful enterprises.
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