Sleeze, while I do not disagree with you I am truly surprised: happily so! Am glad you did not go through what both myself and the other DGCA approved TRE/I's did at airlines such as Air India.
The overwhelming majority of ex IAF "Commanders" I had experience with via personal experience and colleagues' conversations detailed nothing but archaic methods of bastardry techniques belittling those they saw beneath them: the FO's and FA's to name but two. CRM skills were as alien to them as humility and integrity, least of all common human courtesy. The FO's were the worse because you would witness how they kissed the tail of the Capt they were with as opposed to how they treated the FA's. You just knew the true charactor of the person behind all the BS.
Air India and the entire DGCA is a despicable cesspit of abhorrent corruption. There are of course some highly talented individual pilots out there and it is shame to see their passion and skill caught up in this.
I flew with an ex-IAF instructor (at AI as 777 FO) who's x-wind take off technique drew a "taking over" call from me at <100 ft AGL (JFK). Zero technique applied and zero scope to see what was happening as a result of this severe lack of skill and training. (Wide body transports operate differently to single pilots jets. He didn't get it, was never taught and didn't want to know either). Who to blame? Him or the SYSTEM that checked him to line and deems this OK?
So far in the past few months we've seen kids forging log books to mask 20 hours as >200 hrs, others checked to line on 737NG (in the case at point), etc yet unable to recover from straight & level flight once the autopilot is kicked out, "Commanders" landing on the nose gear, more and more "Captains" with forged credentials, license theory passes and certificates (from flying school to airline to the regulatory body...). Also, don't forget!! In India EVERY pilot is called "Captain" be they playing flight sim on their desktop or FO with 185 hrs TT in the RHS of 777 over Afghanistan.
And what of Mangalore? Lives lost and truths uncovered yet covered up quicker. What was the knee jerk reaction of the airline with ZERO evidence immediately after the crash: blame the expat. Pure and utter xenophobia that is also rampant and supported.
Now look at the expat contracts: rampant with fraud from shady dealings between shady agencies and corrupt as hell departments at airlines such as AI.
Some FO's told me of their "batch-mates" bribing DGCA officials to "lose" their colleagues papers for ATPL certification or endorsement licensing so they could get 3 or 6 months ahead of them in the pecking order.
FO's logging P1 U/S for legs flown as well and those not flown by them whether the Capt was TRI qualified or not. Of course these sectors have to be signed off and stamped by the relevant PIC. That isn't hard to do when a kid presents a log book with a multitude of post-it stickers throughout it, banking on either the TRI's ignorance or willing compliance to keep the "system" he/she graduated from alive and well. Then with seemingly minimal REAL time these corrupt children are made "Commander"!!!!
Corruption is an ops normal means of business in that part of the world and that industry. The FAA, ICAO and Boeing are but 3 bodies aware of what goes on via numerous reports submitted.......and nothing.
Some minimal searching on this forum will offer up some behind the scenes truths.
Fly as pax on a VT reg? NEVER.