Incredible India for expats...or better not?
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Incredible India for expats...or better not?
Please read this carefully and decide for yourself. Own experience and confirmations from several colleagues and friends have been used to summarize as follows.
India is an amazing place, you have two choices, love it or hate it; if you hate it, do yourself, your family and your health a favor, leave, don't go again, forget about it.
If you love it, you will find crowded towns, dirty environment, interesting places, nice and friendly people, spicy (but excellent) food, good quality hotels, all sort of contradiction at every corner.
And you will find a growing aviation industry. No, not growing, exploding is the real term. The first wave of explosions started in 1993/94 and just a few years back the second wave rolled in.
All followed the world economies and it went smoother also in India.
As other industry sectors have discovered over many years the same rushed and useless, even stupid and ridiculous changes in laws and so called orders entered the aviation industry; this despite maintaining the poor and dangerously lazy approach towards existing, well below world standard safety related procedures.
Corruption at all levels, starting with the security check at the airport, all the way up to his highness the DGCA (well, the one I am talking about is gone meanwhile...he must still have the golden vase in which the flowers for his wife were presented) has opened doors for many players in the field.
Recent changes force Indian airlines to find more expats working for them, they are needed not only to replace medically "unfit" colleagues, also the still ongoing growth demands more drivers. And the Indian pilot market is presently also under investigation, more hidden details will be discovered over time.
The medical issue is not just a simple one. India refuses to convert your licence, and it will have no value anywhere else anyway, you will only be issued a validation, of course based on your present licence. One step to have said validation issued is the medical exam. I will not go through these details here again, there are other explicit description on here available already; tiredness and sleepiness of one pilot has been claimed to be the major contributing factor in the Mangalore crash, a horrifying one, and what was the reaction from the authorities? Instead of looking into the real reason for the claimed fatigued pilot, the DGCA and the respective ministry orders medical
exams...just one example of how "solutions" are created.
The next major issue is dealing with the airlines themselves.
Many agencies offer direct contracts with Indian airlines; they may sound lucrative and very interesting, when going down this route, one can find out quickly, however, there are many hidden agendas.
Let's have a look at the contracts, in this case an "award" winning low-cost operator with its headquarter in the capital.
You apply to any of the agencies and send your details as per request. If the agency still accepts to work with this particular airline (it happened several times that agencies simply had enough of the one or other airline and halted further proceedings) your details are checked and the reply to you will be the essential agency application documents and the Indian validation application, the FATA forms.
After two days of comparing, cross-checking, counting, summarizing and scanning all needed items, you are happy and send all to the agency to support your application.
The only document you have in your hands is the proposal of what the airline "may" offer. Your request to have a draft copy of the final contract is denied as this will only be available once the process in India is completed. And this may take up 3 months or even more....as it happened in 2010. Seven months of sending papers forward and backwards, submitting new forms as the DGCA changed the FATA forms, supplying even more documents, re-submitting documents which were meanwhile expired...Until you eventually have enough of this nonsense and continue to pursue other projects.
A wake-up call may happen after a month or so and the Chief Pilot of said airline will conduct a quick interview on the phone, so prepare yourself and live with your questions glued to your body as it will happen out of the blue. The agency will confirm that you are selected and that all will be fine....until the airline decides to employ some retired ex-airforce wing commanders and colonels, who need to show in the office that they know what they are doing and confirm on a daily basis their needed presence (play being busy while not doing anything...). You will discover this in receiving another out of the blue phone call of a more drunken sounding representative of the airline, barely even able to introduce himself properly; some mumbling about another needed interview and scrutinizing of documents and more stuttering will allow the Indian phone company to proof with their bill the importance of this nonsense call.
Your agency may be so friendly to confirm to you that you are not the only one who has been called, it should not have happened and the airline is already looking into the problem to solve and stop this issue. Allright, all moves then....really? Yes, it does! Beside this "strange" phone call, you will suddenly receive some more calls, this time the caller-ID is somehow strangely shortened, only few digits are shown, but clearly from India. And the caller? Well, I received personally 3 calls, each time from a different person, each time very insulting and very threatening; in strong vocabulary I was given the clear message to not even consider to pursue any further my application with this airline and any other Indian airline as otherwise my health may be in jeopardy upon arrival in India....now, should I be frightened? At least I was left with the question of how these guys got hold of the knowledge about my application and my phone number....You still hope to continue?
Now, if you are lucky to get your mailbox suddenly showing "We proudly present ...." your body will most probably experience the best vertigo you have ever heard of.
In short, the company will be allowed to do anything with you, while you have no rights and not even a chance to object. You may remember that India is supposed to be a democracy, that obviously does not apply to the environment in an airline; and the best thing still has to be discovered, the agencies proposal about the contract was "upgraded" to limit your rights and your perks even more...
A few details:
- The contract start date is not when you commence your duty, it is when you report for duty, whenever that may be after clearances etc.
- Also you expect a tax-free salary, acc. to the contract tax will be deducted as well as statutory payments, no explanation about these ones, you will contribute a PF according company rules..what?
- Not one word in the contract about who is responsible for the costs of obtaining and maintaining Indian validation etc. however, it says that you have to pay FRRO, whatever that is.
- You will be required to get a working permit, a residence permit etc...a PAN numer (what is that...) and the costs???? Of course, you have off-days, you will take your private time for all this...also for the medical, and that takes easily 3 days and most probably not even at your base...
- There are references in the contract to other clauses, which in turn are not even mentioned in the contract...
- There is a reference to holidays to be explained in appendix "A", which does not even show anywhere the word "holiday"...
- Also you have to provide any personal changes to the company, this contract makes you responsible that the company updates your records...how will that work?
- The airline is allowed to lower your salary, put you on unpaid leave, kick you out as they like. You can resign, yes, with a ban of minimum 6 months to join any other airline in India (if you still want to stay in the country) and a no objection certificate may be expected whenever the company wants to issue one...
- You will receive manuals and other items, if you tear one page out, you will have to buy a new one...
- You are supposed to sign the contract "as being present in India" and you confirm that you have taken legal advise about the contract, how will you do this in your home-country...
- Medical provided, however, not for international flights and layovers
- Home base may be changed to be in any country...really? I doubt that I like Bahrain these days...
- All clauses in the contract can be changed by the company at any given time....and you cannot even refuse any of them...it is written like this.
15 months between the initial contact and having the first chance to read the contract, and I did not mention all details; my list is 37 items long, too long to expect any cooperation possible.
My health will not be threatened, further interviews will not be required, my decision is clear, sad about the wasted time...a draft contract right at the beginning will have saved a lot of headache for many people...now, I need vacation after this all...
India is an amazing place, you have two choices, love it or hate it; if you hate it, do yourself, your family and your health a favor, leave, don't go again, forget about it.
If you love it, you will find crowded towns, dirty environment, interesting places, nice and friendly people, spicy (but excellent) food, good quality hotels, all sort of contradiction at every corner.
And you will find a growing aviation industry. No, not growing, exploding is the real term. The first wave of explosions started in 1993/94 and just a few years back the second wave rolled in.
All followed the world economies and it went smoother also in India.
As other industry sectors have discovered over many years the same rushed and useless, even stupid and ridiculous changes in laws and so called orders entered the aviation industry; this despite maintaining the poor and dangerously lazy approach towards existing, well below world standard safety related procedures.
Corruption at all levels, starting with the security check at the airport, all the way up to his highness the DGCA (well, the one I am talking about is gone meanwhile...he must still have the golden vase in which the flowers for his wife were presented) has opened doors for many players in the field.
Recent changes force Indian airlines to find more expats working for them, they are needed not only to replace medically "unfit" colleagues, also the still ongoing growth demands more drivers. And the Indian pilot market is presently also under investigation, more hidden details will be discovered over time.
The medical issue is not just a simple one. India refuses to convert your licence, and it will have no value anywhere else anyway, you will only be issued a validation, of course based on your present licence. One step to have said validation issued is the medical exam. I will not go through these details here again, there are other explicit description on here available already; tiredness and sleepiness of one pilot has been claimed to be the major contributing factor in the Mangalore crash, a horrifying one, and what was the reaction from the authorities? Instead of looking into the real reason for the claimed fatigued pilot, the DGCA and the respective ministry orders medical
exams...just one example of how "solutions" are created.
The next major issue is dealing with the airlines themselves.
Many agencies offer direct contracts with Indian airlines; they may sound lucrative and very interesting, when going down this route, one can find out quickly, however, there are many hidden agendas.
Let's have a look at the contracts, in this case an "award" winning low-cost operator with its headquarter in the capital.
You apply to any of the agencies and send your details as per request. If the agency still accepts to work with this particular airline (it happened several times that agencies simply had enough of the one or other airline and halted further proceedings) your details are checked and the reply to you will be the essential agency application documents and the Indian validation application, the FATA forms.
After two days of comparing, cross-checking, counting, summarizing and scanning all needed items, you are happy and send all to the agency to support your application.
The only document you have in your hands is the proposal of what the airline "may" offer. Your request to have a draft copy of the final contract is denied as this will only be available once the process in India is completed. And this may take up 3 months or even more....as it happened in 2010. Seven months of sending papers forward and backwards, submitting new forms as the DGCA changed the FATA forms, supplying even more documents, re-submitting documents which were meanwhile expired...Until you eventually have enough of this nonsense and continue to pursue other projects.
A wake-up call may happen after a month or so and the Chief Pilot of said airline will conduct a quick interview on the phone, so prepare yourself and live with your questions glued to your body as it will happen out of the blue. The agency will confirm that you are selected and that all will be fine....until the airline decides to employ some retired ex-airforce wing commanders and colonels, who need to show in the office that they know what they are doing and confirm on a daily basis their needed presence (play being busy while not doing anything...). You will discover this in receiving another out of the blue phone call of a more drunken sounding representative of the airline, barely even able to introduce himself properly; some mumbling about another needed interview and scrutinizing of documents and more stuttering will allow the Indian phone company to proof with their bill the importance of this nonsense call.
Your agency may be so friendly to confirm to you that you are not the only one who has been called, it should not have happened and the airline is already looking into the problem to solve and stop this issue. Allright, all moves then....really? Yes, it does! Beside this "strange" phone call, you will suddenly receive some more calls, this time the caller-ID is somehow strangely shortened, only few digits are shown, but clearly from India. And the caller? Well, I received personally 3 calls, each time from a different person, each time very insulting and very threatening; in strong vocabulary I was given the clear message to not even consider to pursue any further my application with this airline and any other Indian airline as otherwise my health may be in jeopardy upon arrival in India....now, should I be frightened? At least I was left with the question of how these guys got hold of the knowledge about my application and my phone number....You still hope to continue?
Now, if you are lucky to get your mailbox suddenly showing "We proudly present ...." your body will most probably experience the best vertigo you have ever heard of.
In short, the company will be allowed to do anything with you, while you have no rights and not even a chance to object. You may remember that India is supposed to be a democracy, that obviously does not apply to the environment in an airline; and the best thing still has to be discovered, the agencies proposal about the contract was "upgraded" to limit your rights and your perks even more...
A few details:
- The contract start date is not when you commence your duty, it is when you report for duty, whenever that may be after clearances etc.
- Also you expect a tax-free salary, acc. to the contract tax will be deducted as well as statutory payments, no explanation about these ones, you will contribute a PF according company rules..what?
- Not one word in the contract about who is responsible for the costs of obtaining and maintaining Indian validation etc. however, it says that you have to pay FRRO, whatever that is.
- You will be required to get a working permit, a residence permit etc...a PAN numer (what is that...) and the costs???? Of course, you have off-days, you will take your private time for all this...also for the medical, and that takes easily 3 days and most probably not even at your base...
- There are references in the contract to other clauses, which in turn are not even mentioned in the contract...
- There is a reference to holidays to be explained in appendix "A", which does not even show anywhere the word "holiday"...
- Also you have to provide any personal changes to the company, this contract makes you responsible that the company updates your records...how will that work?
- The airline is allowed to lower your salary, put you on unpaid leave, kick you out as they like. You can resign, yes, with a ban of minimum 6 months to join any other airline in India (if you still want to stay in the country) and a no objection certificate may be expected whenever the company wants to issue one...
- You will receive manuals and other items, if you tear one page out, you will have to buy a new one...
- You are supposed to sign the contract "as being present in India" and you confirm that you have taken legal advise about the contract, how will you do this in your home-country...
- Medical provided, however, not for international flights and layovers
- Home base may be changed to be in any country...really? I doubt that I like Bahrain these days...
- All clauses in the contract can be changed by the company at any given time....and you cannot even refuse any of them...it is written like this.
15 months between the initial contact and having the first chance to read the contract, and I did not mention all details; my list is 37 items long, too long to expect any cooperation possible.
My health will not be threatened, further interviews will not be required, my decision is clear, sad about the wasted time...a draft contract right at the beginning will have saved a lot of headache for many people...now, I need vacation after this all...
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Vacation
Enjoy a incredible vacation and recover from the stress.
Just for the sake of it: I could bail out early enough and have no intention to go anywhere close again. I did like it but it was too incredible for me. Does that tell you something?
Fly safe and land happy
NG
Just for the sake of it: I could bail out early enough and have no intention to go anywhere close again. I did like it but it was too incredible for me. Does that tell you something?
Fly safe and land happy
NG
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Freezing Fog
Quite superb post. Thanks for sharing and I am sure it will be a reference post for all thinking of going to that awful place. I doubt that there will be change. Corruption is a way of life out there. My Gramps was in the Army there and tells me that it was the same under British Rule ! It has just got worse, dirtier and full of tin-pot soldiers who think they are doing a good job. FFog, enjoy your freedom and peace of mind. Nothing will tempt me there, thanks to you.
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Crazy and Incredible, yes!
Excellent Freezer, well done. I worked myself in India for a couple of years during the "first wave" as you call it. Was thinking of going again, just because of people and friends there....I got the contract in about 3 months after initial contact. What stuttered me was the term "Salary will be paid around the end of the month", beside a lot of other strange wordings...
Stay away, the only answer I have.
Stay away, the only answer I have.
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Every day for months (or is it now closer to years?) every agency & his dog are advertising positions in India, sometimes twice a day 
on flightglobal.com.
This fiasco is a carbon copy of the Turkish Airlines scenario this last few years.
Basic logic would suggest the reason for the constant need for new blood may NOT be related to the satisfaction felt by those who decide to give it a go anyhow.
A colleague recently returned from Garuda strongly suggests you add them to the "avoid list" for good measure.
His experiences sound, in every respect, something of a horror story.
on flightglobal.com.This fiasco is a carbon copy of the Turkish Airlines scenario this last few years.
Basic logic would suggest the reason for the constant need for new blood may NOT be related to the satisfaction felt by those who decide to give it a go anyhow.
A colleague recently returned from Garuda strongly suggests you add them to the "avoid list" for good measure.
His experiences sound, in every respect, something of a horror story.
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If you prefer 10 weeks on / 3 weeks off or 8 weeks on/2 weeks off, all the health/traffic/pollution problems, and a fair old dose of crm glitches, not to mention being thoughrolly unwelcome & having to do an astronaut medical for no good reason - instead of, home every night (if you can get base choice & or rebase your self & family) a base somewhere nice in Europe & robust SOP's & a universally acceptable standard. . . . then yes, I suppose it is better than Ryanair 
Oh BTW, why do you reckon it is better than say Fly Dubai or a Chinese company
(certainly isn't due to climate/money/ ability of your co-pilot )
Oh BTW, why do you reckon it is better than say Fly Dubai or a Chinese company
(certainly isn't due to climate/money/ ability of your co-pilot )
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You are obviously referring to Spice and I will stay as far away as possible from this HR outfit. There is an impending exodus of expats from here because of.... well.... a complete disconnect from the realities of the current market.
They do not know how to treat flight crew, local and expats, and they are paying the price with almost daily delays and cancellations because of lack of crew. Flight crew are grappling with rostering, accommodation and pay issues and the dimwits in HR have no idea what's about to hit them. Do not expect anything from flt ops as they are just there to rake in the moolah and HR has them on a tight leash.
The contracts are vaguely worded and be rest assured that any contentious issue will lead to an interpretation of your contract in their favour.
And a word of advice about your PF. Your AND the company's contribution comes from your salary (which they won't tell you in reality is CTC). Also a new rule has been implemented where no foreign citizen is allowed to withdraw the monies from your PF until the age of 58. You have to maintain an ACTIVE Indian bank a/c during this whole period and will have to return to India PERSONALLY to collect the money.
Indian airlines are not all bad. I would recommend Jet over Spice. Most of your issues are Spice specific. The medical is a tuffie and has to be negotiated, same as China. And living here is not easy.
They do not know how to treat flight crew, local and expats, and they are paying the price with almost daily delays and cancellations because of lack of crew. Flight crew are grappling with rostering, accommodation and pay issues and the dimwits in HR have no idea what's about to hit them. Do not expect anything from flt ops as they are just there to rake in the moolah and HR has them on a tight leash.
The contracts are vaguely worded and be rest assured that any contentious issue will lead to an interpretation of your contract in their favour.
And a word of advice about your PF. Your AND the company's contribution comes from your salary (which they won't tell you in reality is CTC). Also a new rule has been implemented where no foreign citizen is allowed to withdraw the monies from your PF until the age of 58. You have to maintain an ACTIVE Indian bank a/c during this whole period and will have to return to India PERSONALLY to collect the money.
Indian airlines are not all bad. I would recommend Jet over Spice. Most of your issues are Spice specific. The medical is a tuffie and has to be negotiated, same as China. And living here is not easy.
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Great summary
thanks for the great summary... I had exactly (what you described) happen to me too... and when I sent a clarification email to the deputy C/P and FOM (Retd) Col. I was ordered to sign the contract immediately and present myself at the nearest Indian embassy... the farking paper work and time involved is insane... I have been on contracts all over the world and this is by far the biggest waste of time and energy...
It could be so simple: clarified contract right down to the last detail, they cover all the costs of the paperwork/visa etc etc... provide a 5 star hotel, and pay my salary in a foreign bank account and provide a driver to take us to/from work..... what got me was that Spice wouldn't clarify when you actually start getting paid.
India could have been an interesting side show for awhile, but I think if you have a good job already, then stay put and forget about this place...
It would be in Spice's best interest to take a long hard look at how they do things... if they want skilled and experienced foreign pilots, then they better simplify things, clarify details and get their crap in order...
too bad....
6to8
It could be so simple: clarified contract right down to the last detail, they cover all the costs of the paperwork/visa etc etc... provide a 5 star hotel, and pay my salary in a foreign bank account and provide a driver to take us to/from work..... what got me was that Spice wouldn't clarify when you actually start getting paid.
India could have been an interesting side show for awhile, but I think if you have a good job already, then stay put and forget about this place...
It would be in Spice's best interest to take a long hard look at how they do things... if they want skilled and experienced foreign pilots, then they better simplify things, clarify details and get their crap in order...
too bad....
6to8
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All the above! I loved in India, did several stints there but never more than 6 weeks at a time, and was working for a local franchise of an international company and did not encounter the frustrations and the daily merry-go-rounds mentioned as my work was administrative and marketing.
The variety of tastes and sights and smells is mind blowing ...
Here are a few notes I made on one of my first trips. I never finished it but for what it's worth ... enjoy :
The variety of tastes and sights and smells is mind blowing ...
Here are a few notes I made on one of my first trips. I never finished it but for what it's worth ... enjoy :
INDIA
My first impression on arrival at Indira Gandhi International Airport in Delhi was of incredible heat, even at one o’clock in the morning, dust, and bustle. This I soon got used to, but the feeling that took many days to go away was of being surrounded by thousands of people doing non-stop impersonations of Peter Sellers. I kept wondering when they were going to start talking ‘normally’.
There was no sign of the driver who was supposed to meet me with a placard bearing my name, but half an hour later and after many increasingly irritating approaches from taxi touts, I went to the driver who was holding the sign with the name least unlike mine : Mr. Christiansen. I had ruled out ‘Dieter Albrechts’, ‘Mr. & Mrs. Stevens’, and ‘Vladislav Fedovski’ as totally impossible, even in a country where anything seemed possible. My intuition was correct. The driver greeted me like a long lost friend and began the usual totally uninhibited Indian Inquisition as we set off for my luxury hotel, where the price of a beer would feed a family of four for a day. After pretending not to know the hotel, the Imperial, one of Delhi’s landmarks, he informed me that it had cancelled all reservations due to the arrival of a group from the United Nations, but offered to take me to a hotel of equal, if not superior, standard, where a friend of his worked, and which would cost me only a few pounds a night. I assured him that I had reconfirmed my reservation and that my room was held. He insisted that it wasn’t. I solved the problem by telling him that if we arrived to find my room unavailable I would give him 2000 rupees (the average monthly earning for an Indian taxi driver) and allow him to take me to his friend’s hotel. This shut him up for a while until I heard the ominous words, ‘Indian girls very pretty sir, very hot …..’ From this point I had to spend the rest of the journey declining the offer of various services, of which I should add he would have been the facilitator, not the actual provider.
We were travelling in one of India’s ubiquitous Hindustan Ambassadors, a 1930’s design which has barely changed over the years, and which, to misquote Henry Ford, is available in any shade of grey. The horn never stopped blaring as we wove our way past, or rather, through, the whirling maelstroms of ancient cars, rickshaws, unlit but garishly decorated lorries looming out of the dust and belching evil smelling smoke blacker than the surrounding night, cows, and suicidal pedestrians. The rule of the road is driving on the left. What this means is 'drive on any part of the roadway which is left free'. The only order to Indian driving is chaos, the closest I have experienced being the dodgem cars at the funfair. Most vehicles have a sign on the back, the commonest being ‘Horn Please’, and ‘Keep Distance’. The constant hooting is not aggression, but a reflex more natural to Indian drivers than breathing. The miracle is that there are so few accidents – sadly those that do occur are usually serious. Overtaking, or just getting into any vehicle on the overcrowded roads, is simply an act of faith in God – there is no other way to explain it in a country where a two lane road contains four or five lanes of jousting traffic. Skill and judgement do not enter the equation. So few vehicles have tyres with visible tread that I wonder if somewhere there is a factory producing slicks for the Indian market. Lights are a rare luxury, the most important piece of equipment on any vehicle being a powerful and strident horn. When I once needed a really vicious horn for my car in Europe, I made a point of buying it in India.
In the large cities, most of the modern vehicles are locally produced versions of popular small Japanese models, but one sees the occasional Mercedes, usually with diplomatic numberplates, cruising serenely through the chaotically gyrating streams of traffic without a scratch on its immaculate gleaming paintwork. This proves that there is some divine force at work protecting the innocent and the foolish.
The first time I saw three people on a motor scooter, I gave a second glance. They looked happy and comfortable. Then I saw four. Not long after that I started counting. Up to now, I have seen three adults, two children, and a baby all perched, balanced, or hanging on to a scooter. I still look, but somehow can’t visualise this record of six being broken. No doubt, somewhere, not far away, there are seven people on a two wheeler. In the meantime, five doesn’t merit a turn of the head.
In Agra, the spectacularly filthy town closest to the Taj Mahal, one of the world’s greatest monuments to love and architecture, I met the only truly unpleasant and dishonest Indian I have ever encountered inside India. This ‘gentleman’ was the owner of a shop where I asked the price of the various boxed teas on display. He quoted me a figure, my mind calculated this back into real money, recalculated, started again, and ground to a halt. Not being the world’s greatest mathematician, I asked for a calculator, and proved that my mental assessment of the value of this tea being just a little less than the price of gold was correct. I asked for a new quote and he came down by about 10%, assuring me that his family would starve, bringing the price into line with 18 carat gold rather than pure 24 carat. “This tea”, I told him (it was Orange Pekoe), “is sold in England for a fraction of your price”. “Ah, but mine is export quality”, he explained. I replied that I would have expected the Indian tea sold in London to be export quality too. He ushered me out uttering curses which, had they come true, would have ensured that these lines would never have been written, and closed the shop.
It was also in Agra, teeming with low budget travellers ‘doing’ India, that I met a young Scotsman who was suffering from some a skin complaint probably caused by self-inflicted malnutrition, and who could have been the model for the unkind and untrue jibes about the Scots being ‘cautious’ with their money. He was staying, he told me, in a hostel that ‘had the ******* temerity to charge 30 rupees a night for a single ******* room and breakfast – no’ a cooked ******* breakfast mind, just some ******* Indian ****e and sour ******* milk’. India, he told me, was the biggest ripoff in the world and he was sick and tired of the ‘grasping’ Indians. In the Taj Mahal, where at one point you have to remove your shoes, the attendant who keeps them for you expects a small tip. I gave him 10 rupees and he was perfectly happy. ”How much do yae want” asked the Scot. “I am happy with whatever you like to give me Sir”, was the Indian’s humble reply. Walking off in shame and despair I heard, “Just tell me the ******* price will ye ….”
I went to an ATM in Delhi one afternoon and drew Rs. 6000 (about £90) in crisp new 500 Rupee notes. I then went to the counter and asked the cashier to change one of the 500's for 100's. He was quite hesitant about this, and I waited for the inevitable Indian style form, with dozens of badly printed columns and squares, to be produced, completed, countersigned and stamped a few times before the operation could be performed. In fact the problem was not a bureaucratic one. He examined the banknote for about five minutes, microscopically, as only Indians can, consulted various bits of paper and colleagues, took it out the back, and came back shaking his head and saying it was a forgery. So I produced the other 11, all still in order and consecutively numbered, and asked him about those. At that point he began to have some doubts - I still hadn't told him they'd just come from their own ATM.
He took them and said they were also forgeries and, with that side to side motion of the head that is unique to the Indian subcontinent, added that ‘’it is very unwise to be changing money with street money changers - all are rascals, Sir, I am telling you!”
Then I produced the ATM slip, revealing the source of the money, and asked if this bank was in the habit of stocking their ATM's with forged banknotes. To say he was embarrassed would be an understatement!
Many such day to day transactions which at home are simple, in India become epics due to the Indian love of bureaucracy, the intense competition, and the natural entrepeneur in every Indian. I enquired about a taxi from my hotel to the airport and of course was assured it was no problem. I requested the price and was told 'fixed price'. I pressed for further details of the fixed price but it could not be quantified. Eventually the best answer I could elicit was : "price is being fixed by driver, sir."
I went to buy a railway ticket from the Pink City of Jaipur, home of the 'Palace of the Winds', or 'The Palace of Wind' as it was unfortunately described in one publication, to the serene and beautiful city of Udaipur, on Lake Pichola. Indian trains do not comprise merely first class and second class, but three classes and a myriad of further subdivisions such as 'chair' class, all of which is further divided by types of train, categorised as air conditioned or non-air-conditioned. Being a rabid hater of air conditioning, I selected first class non airconditioned and was issued with a computer printed ticket showing seat number, time, date, fare paid, reservation number, and no doubt, somewhere, my passport number and the identity number of the man who made the reservation. My seat was a comfortable swivel chair which I could turn to enjoy the cooling breeze from the open window. Whilst we were moving it was perfect. Every time we stopped the stench from the toilets became unbearable.
I was roundly ticked off and given a long but friendly lecture by a wealthy and educated Indian family after I gave a couple of rupees to a beggar woman on one of the stations. Giving them money, they said, encourages begging and they then do nothing to help themselves. True, but the class system in India does not allow these people to help themselves in any other way than begging, so they are caught in a vicious spiral. The wealthy cannot accept that the same system that made them wealthy keeps millions with no hope of ever rising above the abject poverty which condemns them to be born, live, and die with no roof over their heads. The luckiest are those who live in railway stations. I found this stonehearted refusal by the privileged to even acknowledge the terrible plight of the poor one of the hardest things to accept about this country and its people, who in other ways are amongst the most gentle and generous in the world.
The monsoon, long awaited, brings relief from the high temperatures, it also brings sudden deluges, health hazards, and power cuts. The solid matter (I do mean what you think I mean) which is to be found on the streets when they are dry, now floats. Being splashed by a passing vehicle takes on a new meaning. It is an unpleasant time of the year in India's cities, most of all for homeless millions.
The scale of the poverty in India is almost beyond belief. The country has 100 million homeless children. In case you think you read wrong, I repeat, the number of homeless children in India is more than double the entire population of Africa south of the Limpopo, or almost double the population of the UK. A horrifying statistic. And yet despite the poverty, it is a country with very little crime and one in which it is safe to walk around day or night - perhaps a little intimidating - but not dangerous.
India is a country of contrasts, from opulent Maharajah's palaces beyond the dreams of most people, to the abject poverty which condemns millions to live their entire lives without ever having shelter over their heads. A fascinating country with a rich and varied civilisation and a tradition of giving and hospitality which puts Western values to shame. It is perhaps a country to experience and appreciate rather than to enjoy.
Something I did enjoy was an Indian wine called Riviera which I tried out of politeness and curiosity when it was offered to me at a cocktail party at the magnificiently renovated Imperial Hotel in New Delhi, an establishment which makes most hotels in the West look tatty. It was a fruity, off-dry and very pleasant wine with low acidity, produce of the coastal area near Bombay.
The newspapers provide beautifully anachronistic and eccentric usage of the English language. The quality newspapers are written in the English of the 1940’s referring to ‘outrage at the dastardly acts of these bounders’, in articles about the frequently occurring minor frauds and scams. Although the standard of writing is high, there are many factual errors and amusing misprints, such as the man who appeared with a ‘two day growth of bread on his chin’, or the man so incensed about his wife’s continual chatting that he returned home one evening with ‘stout stick in hand and proceeded to eat her with self same stick’. Until reading this, I had no idea that cannibalism was alive and well in India. These errors, or for a further example, a two-wheeler becoming a ‘two willer’, will not be corrected by conventional spell checkers.
In personal correspondence too, this 'Jeeves' style of English is used by the more educated, or this wishing to appear so. After a business trip to India, I received a letter, typed on a machine that had clearly seen better days, probably in a civil servant's office, in which I was asked to convey 'humble gratitude' to a colleague, who amongst other things, was 'a jolly good fellow'.
Arranged, rather than forced, marriages are frequent and acceptable. Sunday newspapers carry pages of ‘Matrimonials’ - adverts placed by parents, categorised by caste, religion, profession, and educational qualifications, or even ‘green card holders’. These really are advertisements in the true sense of the word, extolling the virtues of their offspring, all of whom are ‘extremely handsome’, ‘beautiful’, ‘fair and graceful’, ‘wheatish slim’, ‘talented and charming’, or at the very least ‘smart in appearance and well qualified’. One assumes that the less favoured find their own partners. A major selling point is a US visa, the exact type and validity of this being specified in the announcement.
The most frequently requested characteristics are : ‘clean habits’, ‘cultured family’, ‘graduated’, ‘proper height’, ‘fair’, whilst education and profession are other criteria. Most ask for ‘bio-data and horoscope’, some even request ‘recent full and close-up photos of professional quality’. As always in India, highly cryptic abbreviations abound along with phrases such as ‘lofty personal traits in spouse are solicited’.
Some of the signs seen in the streets are remarkable too. Some are hard to understand, others merely amusing, and one wonders just what is behind some of them. A few examples:
Rajeet Helth Products : Concreet and Marbel Division
Foreign monies and t/c’s changed here. Service optional.
Free water sold here.
Hotel : All luxurious rooms have lock with key, running water and other enemetics.
Bum Chums (this is a make of mens’ underwear!) : A man’s best friend.
SCAM : School for Accounting and Marketing.
Cheap Womens Clothing Store
Cars from Outside or Inside are not allowed Inside
The love for abbreviations and acronyms which abounds in newspapers articles, advertisements, and signboards does not facilitate understanding. Airports and railway stations are the places to look for signs such as :
A/P Psgr. If IO conduct not satisfactory pls. to ctc. C.I.O.O.D on ext. 431.
This love for abbreviations probably dates back to the military days and at my office we used to receive telex messages addressed to ‘Staff On Duty’, unfortunately abbreviated to : “ATTN SOD” (why waste full stops!), and continuing to say ‘please do the needful to rectify situation in shortest time frame and revert.’ These phrases cropped up so frequently that one has to assume that they are taught in schools.
To be continued ................
My first impression on arrival at Indira Gandhi International Airport in Delhi was of incredible heat, even at one o’clock in the morning, dust, and bustle. This I soon got used to, but the feeling that took many days to go away was of being surrounded by thousands of people doing non-stop impersonations of Peter Sellers. I kept wondering when they were going to start talking ‘normally’.
There was no sign of the driver who was supposed to meet me with a placard bearing my name, but half an hour later and after many increasingly irritating approaches from taxi touts, I went to the driver who was holding the sign with the name least unlike mine : Mr. Christiansen. I had ruled out ‘Dieter Albrechts’, ‘Mr. & Mrs. Stevens’, and ‘Vladislav Fedovski’ as totally impossible, even in a country where anything seemed possible. My intuition was correct. The driver greeted me like a long lost friend and began the usual totally uninhibited Indian Inquisition as we set off for my luxury hotel, where the price of a beer would feed a family of four for a day. After pretending not to know the hotel, the Imperial, one of Delhi’s landmarks, he informed me that it had cancelled all reservations due to the arrival of a group from the United Nations, but offered to take me to a hotel of equal, if not superior, standard, where a friend of his worked, and which would cost me only a few pounds a night. I assured him that I had reconfirmed my reservation and that my room was held. He insisted that it wasn’t. I solved the problem by telling him that if we arrived to find my room unavailable I would give him 2000 rupees (the average monthly earning for an Indian taxi driver) and allow him to take me to his friend’s hotel. This shut him up for a while until I heard the ominous words, ‘Indian girls very pretty sir, very hot …..’ From this point I had to spend the rest of the journey declining the offer of various services, of which I should add he would have been the facilitator, not the actual provider.
We were travelling in one of India’s ubiquitous Hindustan Ambassadors, a 1930’s design which has barely changed over the years, and which, to misquote Henry Ford, is available in any shade of grey. The horn never stopped blaring as we wove our way past, or rather, through, the whirling maelstroms of ancient cars, rickshaws, unlit but garishly decorated lorries looming out of the dust and belching evil smelling smoke blacker than the surrounding night, cows, and suicidal pedestrians. The rule of the road is driving on the left. What this means is 'drive on any part of the roadway which is left free'. The only order to Indian driving is chaos, the closest I have experienced being the dodgem cars at the funfair. Most vehicles have a sign on the back, the commonest being ‘Horn Please’, and ‘Keep Distance’. The constant hooting is not aggression, but a reflex more natural to Indian drivers than breathing. The miracle is that there are so few accidents – sadly those that do occur are usually serious. Overtaking, or just getting into any vehicle on the overcrowded roads, is simply an act of faith in God – there is no other way to explain it in a country where a two lane road contains four or five lanes of jousting traffic. Skill and judgement do not enter the equation. So few vehicles have tyres with visible tread that I wonder if somewhere there is a factory producing slicks for the Indian market. Lights are a rare luxury, the most important piece of equipment on any vehicle being a powerful and strident horn. When I once needed a really vicious horn for my car in Europe, I made a point of buying it in India.
In the large cities, most of the modern vehicles are locally produced versions of popular small Japanese models, but one sees the occasional Mercedes, usually with diplomatic numberplates, cruising serenely through the chaotically gyrating streams of traffic without a scratch on its immaculate gleaming paintwork. This proves that there is some divine force at work protecting the innocent and the foolish.
The first time I saw three people on a motor scooter, I gave a second glance. They looked happy and comfortable. Then I saw four. Not long after that I started counting. Up to now, I have seen three adults, two children, and a baby all perched, balanced, or hanging on to a scooter. I still look, but somehow can’t visualise this record of six being broken. No doubt, somewhere, not far away, there are seven people on a two wheeler. In the meantime, five doesn’t merit a turn of the head.
In Agra, the spectacularly filthy town closest to the Taj Mahal, one of the world’s greatest monuments to love and architecture, I met the only truly unpleasant and dishonest Indian I have ever encountered inside India. This ‘gentleman’ was the owner of a shop where I asked the price of the various boxed teas on display. He quoted me a figure, my mind calculated this back into real money, recalculated, started again, and ground to a halt. Not being the world’s greatest mathematician, I asked for a calculator, and proved that my mental assessment of the value of this tea being just a little less than the price of gold was correct. I asked for a new quote and he came down by about 10%, assuring me that his family would starve, bringing the price into line with 18 carat gold rather than pure 24 carat. “This tea”, I told him (it was Orange Pekoe), “is sold in England for a fraction of your price”. “Ah, but mine is export quality”, he explained. I replied that I would have expected the Indian tea sold in London to be export quality too. He ushered me out uttering curses which, had they come true, would have ensured that these lines would never have been written, and closed the shop.
It was also in Agra, teeming with low budget travellers ‘doing’ India, that I met a young Scotsman who was suffering from some a skin complaint probably caused by self-inflicted malnutrition, and who could have been the model for the unkind and untrue jibes about the Scots being ‘cautious’ with their money. He was staying, he told me, in a hostel that ‘had the ******* temerity to charge 30 rupees a night for a single ******* room and breakfast – no’ a cooked ******* breakfast mind, just some ******* Indian ****e and sour ******* milk’. India, he told me, was the biggest ripoff in the world and he was sick and tired of the ‘grasping’ Indians. In the Taj Mahal, where at one point you have to remove your shoes, the attendant who keeps them for you expects a small tip. I gave him 10 rupees and he was perfectly happy. ”How much do yae want” asked the Scot. “I am happy with whatever you like to give me Sir”, was the Indian’s humble reply. Walking off in shame and despair I heard, “Just tell me the ******* price will ye ….”
I went to an ATM in Delhi one afternoon and drew Rs. 6000 (about £90) in crisp new 500 Rupee notes. I then went to the counter and asked the cashier to change one of the 500's for 100's. He was quite hesitant about this, and I waited for the inevitable Indian style form, with dozens of badly printed columns and squares, to be produced, completed, countersigned and stamped a few times before the operation could be performed. In fact the problem was not a bureaucratic one. He examined the banknote for about five minutes, microscopically, as only Indians can, consulted various bits of paper and colleagues, took it out the back, and came back shaking his head and saying it was a forgery. So I produced the other 11, all still in order and consecutively numbered, and asked him about those. At that point he began to have some doubts - I still hadn't told him they'd just come from their own ATM.
He took them and said they were also forgeries and, with that side to side motion of the head that is unique to the Indian subcontinent, added that ‘’it is very unwise to be changing money with street money changers - all are rascals, Sir, I am telling you!”
Then I produced the ATM slip, revealing the source of the money, and asked if this bank was in the habit of stocking their ATM's with forged banknotes. To say he was embarrassed would be an understatement!
Many such day to day transactions which at home are simple, in India become epics due to the Indian love of bureaucracy, the intense competition, and the natural entrepeneur in every Indian. I enquired about a taxi from my hotel to the airport and of course was assured it was no problem. I requested the price and was told 'fixed price'. I pressed for further details of the fixed price but it could not be quantified. Eventually the best answer I could elicit was : "price is being fixed by driver, sir."
I went to buy a railway ticket from the Pink City of Jaipur, home of the 'Palace of the Winds', or 'The Palace of Wind' as it was unfortunately described in one publication, to the serene and beautiful city of Udaipur, on Lake Pichola. Indian trains do not comprise merely first class and second class, but three classes and a myriad of further subdivisions such as 'chair' class, all of which is further divided by types of train, categorised as air conditioned or non-air-conditioned. Being a rabid hater of air conditioning, I selected first class non airconditioned and was issued with a computer printed ticket showing seat number, time, date, fare paid, reservation number, and no doubt, somewhere, my passport number and the identity number of the man who made the reservation. My seat was a comfortable swivel chair which I could turn to enjoy the cooling breeze from the open window. Whilst we were moving it was perfect. Every time we stopped the stench from the toilets became unbearable.
I was roundly ticked off and given a long but friendly lecture by a wealthy and educated Indian family after I gave a couple of rupees to a beggar woman on one of the stations. Giving them money, they said, encourages begging and they then do nothing to help themselves. True, but the class system in India does not allow these people to help themselves in any other way than begging, so they are caught in a vicious spiral. The wealthy cannot accept that the same system that made them wealthy keeps millions with no hope of ever rising above the abject poverty which condemns them to be born, live, and die with no roof over their heads. The luckiest are those who live in railway stations. I found this stonehearted refusal by the privileged to even acknowledge the terrible plight of the poor one of the hardest things to accept about this country and its people, who in other ways are amongst the most gentle and generous in the world.
The monsoon, long awaited, brings relief from the high temperatures, it also brings sudden deluges, health hazards, and power cuts. The solid matter (I do mean what you think I mean) which is to be found on the streets when they are dry, now floats. Being splashed by a passing vehicle takes on a new meaning. It is an unpleasant time of the year in India's cities, most of all for homeless millions.
The scale of the poverty in India is almost beyond belief. The country has 100 million homeless children. In case you think you read wrong, I repeat, the number of homeless children in India is more than double the entire population of Africa south of the Limpopo, or almost double the population of the UK. A horrifying statistic. And yet despite the poverty, it is a country with very little crime and one in which it is safe to walk around day or night - perhaps a little intimidating - but not dangerous.
India is a country of contrasts, from opulent Maharajah's palaces beyond the dreams of most people, to the abject poverty which condemns millions to live their entire lives without ever having shelter over their heads. A fascinating country with a rich and varied civilisation and a tradition of giving and hospitality which puts Western values to shame. It is perhaps a country to experience and appreciate rather than to enjoy.
Something I did enjoy was an Indian wine called Riviera which I tried out of politeness and curiosity when it was offered to me at a cocktail party at the magnificiently renovated Imperial Hotel in New Delhi, an establishment which makes most hotels in the West look tatty. It was a fruity, off-dry and very pleasant wine with low acidity, produce of the coastal area near Bombay.
The newspapers provide beautifully anachronistic and eccentric usage of the English language. The quality newspapers are written in the English of the 1940’s referring to ‘outrage at the dastardly acts of these bounders’, in articles about the frequently occurring minor frauds and scams. Although the standard of writing is high, there are many factual errors and amusing misprints, such as the man who appeared with a ‘two day growth of bread on his chin’, or the man so incensed about his wife’s continual chatting that he returned home one evening with ‘stout stick in hand and proceeded to eat her with self same stick’. Until reading this, I had no idea that cannibalism was alive and well in India. These errors, or for a further example, a two-wheeler becoming a ‘two willer’, will not be corrected by conventional spell checkers.
In personal correspondence too, this 'Jeeves' style of English is used by the more educated, or this wishing to appear so. After a business trip to India, I received a letter, typed on a machine that had clearly seen better days, probably in a civil servant's office, in which I was asked to convey 'humble gratitude' to a colleague, who amongst other things, was 'a jolly good fellow'.
Arranged, rather than forced, marriages are frequent and acceptable. Sunday newspapers carry pages of ‘Matrimonials’ - adverts placed by parents, categorised by caste, religion, profession, and educational qualifications, or even ‘green card holders’. These really are advertisements in the true sense of the word, extolling the virtues of their offspring, all of whom are ‘extremely handsome’, ‘beautiful’, ‘fair and graceful’, ‘wheatish slim’, ‘talented and charming’, or at the very least ‘smart in appearance and well qualified’. One assumes that the less favoured find their own partners. A major selling point is a US visa, the exact type and validity of this being specified in the announcement.
The most frequently requested characteristics are : ‘clean habits’, ‘cultured family’, ‘graduated’, ‘proper height’, ‘fair’, whilst education and profession are other criteria. Most ask for ‘bio-data and horoscope’, some even request ‘recent full and close-up photos of professional quality’. As always in India, highly cryptic abbreviations abound along with phrases such as ‘lofty personal traits in spouse are solicited’.
Some of the signs seen in the streets are remarkable too. Some are hard to understand, others merely amusing, and one wonders just what is behind some of them. A few examples:
Rajeet Helth Products : Concreet and Marbel Division
Foreign monies and t/c’s changed here. Service optional.
Free water sold here.
Hotel : All luxurious rooms have lock with key, running water and other enemetics.
Bum Chums (this is a make of mens’ underwear!) : A man’s best friend.
SCAM : School for Accounting and Marketing.
Cheap Womens Clothing Store
Cars from Outside or Inside are not allowed Inside
The love for abbreviations and acronyms which abounds in newspapers articles, advertisements, and signboards does not facilitate understanding. Airports and railway stations are the places to look for signs such as :
A/P Psgr. If IO conduct not satisfactory pls. to ctc. C.I.O.O.D on ext. 431.
This love for abbreviations probably dates back to the military days and at my office we used to receive telex messages addressed to ‘Staff On Duty’, unfortunately abbreviated to : “ATTN SOD” (why waste full stops!), and continuing to say ‘please do the needful to rectify situation in shortest time frame and revert.’ These phrases cropped up so frequently that one has to assume that they are taught in schools.
To be continued ................
Join Date: Sep 2010
Location: planet earth and the moon
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Spice India HR mess
I know a group which joined there recently and has been paid 50% salary and the rest has been a fiasco. They have still not cleared those pending salaries as the agency involved is fighting for everyones balance salary and at the latest now is that the agency not receiving their payments so called P.M.F. The company is run by bunch of people in HR & Ops who dont know word of ethics and think deducting salaries and agency payments will bring them into profits. They all think they are untouchable and do not honor contracts of either their employees or agencies. Besides that , as a Captain B737 NG , i have had a lot of contracts done in the past , but never heard of any such situations ever.
If they dont solve this current situation and think they are untouchable , they are wrong. As a Former Director i do know, you never cut salaries with the pilots, due to the fact they are responsible for the turnover of the company.if you cut costs this way you loose money at the end.
you cut costs in the office ,where people not capable of handling situations with dignity and respect are fired, nothing more and nothing less .
It has nothing to do with culture, it has to do with mentality and lazyness.
At the end ,they will be stuck with airplanes sitting on the ground with no crews, especially because there are no indian nationals to fly them.
They will chase every qualified and respected pilot away , thanks to their mentality.
The other companies will sit and start increasing their movements.
The strange fact is that the CFO and COO and CEO are not informed about these situations ,the cause is the ,,silence,, of the middle management to them.
Lets wait and see if they proceed with this mentality , when they pay everybody in time as they used to do, and change their mentality , and fire a lot of useless people , it will improve and then there are pilots who wish to start flying and continue flying in India.
If they dont solve this current situation and think they are untouchable , they are wrong. As a Former Director i do know, you never cut salaries with the pilots, due to the fact they are responsible for the turnover of the company.if you cut costs this way you loose money at the end.
you cut costs in the office ,where people not capable of handling situations with dignity and respect are fired, nothing more and nothing less .
It has nothing to do with culture, it has to do with mentality and lazyness.
At the end ,they will be stuck with airplanes sitting on the ground with no crews, especially because there are no indian nationals to fly them.
They will chase every qualified and respected pilot away , thanks to their mentality.
The other companies will sit and start increasing their movements.
The strange fact is that the CFO and COO and CEO are not informed about these situations ,the cause is the ,,silence,, of the middle management to them.
Lets wait and see if they proceed with this mentality , when they pay everybody in time as they used to do, and change their mentality , and fire a lot of useless people , it will improve and then there are pilots who wish to start flying and continue flying in India.
Join Date: Aug 2009
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Capetonian, frightening but very true description of India and Indians.
It amazes me that the UK gives foreign aid to this country, money, that goes straight into a personal swiss bank account, while the government builds space rockets & nuclear arsenals. Millions beg & starve.
Rattan Tata, owner of former British steel (corus) as well as Jaguar L@nd Rover has the cheek to call British Workers lazy & overpaid -
Steel giant Tata to axe 1,500 jobs from three UK factories | Mail Online
Why British managers have a training problem - Leadership, business and management news, tips and features from MT and Management Today magazine
An excuse to cut wages, transfer work (& knowledge) overseas, and shut British plants. Globalisation in the raw.
India - The place is a ****hole full stop
Go to India ? - stay at 35000 feet for another 4 hours & go to Thailand. - I do regularly, few, if any complaints when taking the family there.
Lid
It amazes me that the UK gives foreign aid to this country, money, that goes straight into a personal swiss bank account, while the government builds space rockets & nuclear arsenals. Millions beg & starve.
Rattan Tata, owner of former British steel (corus) as well as Jaguar L@nd Rover has the cheek to call British Workers lazy & overpaid -
Steel giant Tata to axe 1,500 jobs from three UK factories | Mail Online
Why British managers have a training problem - Leadership, business and management news, tips and features from MT and Management Today magazine
An excuse to cut wages, transfer work (& knowledge) overseas, and shut British plants. Globalisation in the raw.
India - The place is a ****hole full stop
Go to India ? - stay at 35000 feet for another 4 hours & go to Thailand. - I do regularly, few, if any complaints when taking the family there.
Lid
Join Date: Jun 2007
Location: Cochin VOCI , India
Age: 35
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@flying lid
The article about Ratan Tata does not explain his side in Full
He said British Manager not british employees .
He mentioned that the regular employees were ready to go the extra mile to make the company work however the managers were not .
Especially when it come to a companies that were in the Red
P.S
We have our fair share of lazy employess too
You can find them in our govt offices
The article about Ratan Tata does not explain his side in Full
He said British Manager not british employees .
He mentioned that the regular employees were ready to go the extra mile to make the company work however the managers were not .
Especially when it come to a companies that were in the Red
P.S
We have our fair share of lazy employess too
You can find them in our govt offices
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Capetonian, excellent, word by word the truth. And almost 4 years in India, also some time ago, fly past my memory and see all these pictures in real again...yes, the Ambassador, had one for six months myself before I swapped it for a Tata Sierra...plus some lakhs of Rupees on top...
It has already been mentioned, however, I need to add a few words here.
There are obviously some colleagues who still dream of a life in India like the grand Raj; for these incredible India dreams I may have some more spices to supply.
After an interesting conversation with a friend I feel the need to open the eyes to the last dreamer as well.
The well known and awarded airline I spoke of earlier here is still in need, and now even more, to secure contracts with expats. There are more and more agencies pulling out of this lucrative alliance after their presented pilots receive the "incredible" treat.
Not too long ago, and I am speaking of just a few weeks here, some Greek friends were forced to find new jobs, and they did, and yes, you guessed right, with said airline.
Something has happend, and there is the usual magic carpet flying very low to cover the dust, and no one of the concerned colleagues is aware of what this may be. Since the company was expecting to have its new recruits exchanging fuel bills in paid tickets and this is obviously not happening, a quick change in the salary payments, just as the contract allows, has been implemented.
This affects "only" 6 pilots and it is "only" 50% of the promised salary which is in dispute now, however, the agency which supplied the pilots has also not received any contractual payments for its work.
Since agencies are also frequently consulting the rumors spread on this forum, this will morph the situation now into a very interesting picture. An agency does the pre-selection, provides all the arrangements (at least that is what should be the case) and all promises with nice PowerPoint presentation from the land of the software gurus are broken. Not so much major news some may say, however, reputable (and also claimed not-so-reputable) are pulling out of India.
While there are ideas to look into a court case, I doubt that anyone has a chance to tackle (as the Indians love to say) the paragraph in the contract which clearly says:
"4.2 Your payment and benefits may be reviewed by the company from time to time at the company's sole discretion......" this beside the fact that there is
"4.1 ....Your compensation is confidential. You should not communicate in any manner, any information with regard to your compensation to any other employee or anyone outside the company."
Now, that will keep you away from courts and lawyers...
Democracy, as I stated earlier in my first posting here, does not work in this airline at all...
Are you still hoping to escape your financial problems in taking on contracts like this one? The only thing you may achieve is the geographical separation with your family, you are still at the wrong end of the foodchain.
Another agency, so I have received confirmation, has stopped working for this extraordinary outfit but, as the whistle blows, the next one has lined up already, this time from the UK again, to collect the litter and transfer this into a shiny and exciting job, of course located in incredible India.
And the Colonel is still on the telephone stuttering and mumbling his useless and empty phrases to eager and unaware colleagues...
Prepare for a tough and rough awakening, the Sun Group holds clouds only for their unaware newcomers...also known as Expats.
It has already been mentioned, however, I need to add a few words here.
There are obviously some colleagues who still dream of a life in India like the grand Raj; for these incredible India dreams I may have some more spices to supply.
After an interesting conversation with a friend I feel the need to open the eyes to the last dreamer as well.
The well known and awarded airline I spoke of earlier here is still in need, and now even more, to secure contracts with expats. There are more and more agencies pulling out of this lucrative alliance after their presented pilots receive the "incredible" treat.
Not too long ago, and I am speaking of just a few weeks here, some Greek friends were forced to find new jobs, and they did, and yes, you guessed right, with said airline.
Something has happend, and there is the usual magic carpet flying very low to cover the dust, and no one of the concerned colleagues is aware of what this may be. Since the company was expecting to have its new recruits exchanging fuel bills in paid tickets and this is obviously not happening, a quick change in the salary payments, just as the contract allows, has been implemented.
This affects "only" 6 pilots and it is "only" 50% of the promised salary which is in dispute now, however, the agency which supplied the pilots has also not received any contractual payments for its work.
Since agencies are also frequently consulting the rumors spread on this forum, this will morph the situation now into a very interesting picture. An agency does the pre-selection, provides all the arrangements (at least that is what should be the case) and all promises with nice PowerPoint presentation from the land of the software gurus are broken. Not so much major news some may say, however, reputable (and also claimed not-so-reputable) are pulling out of India.
While there are ideas to look into a court case, I doubt that anyone has a chance to tackle (as the Indians love to say) the paragraph in the contract which clearly says:
"4.2 Your payment and benefits may be reviewed by the company from time to time at the company's sole discretion......" this beside the fact that there is
"4.1 ....Your compensation is confidential. You should not communicate in any manner, any information with regard to your compensation to any other employee or anyone outside the company."
Now, that will keep you away from courts and lawyers...
Democracy, as I stated earlier in my first posting here, does not work in this airline at all...
Are you still hoping to escape your financial problems in taking on contracts like this one? The only thing you may achieve is the geographical separation with your family, you are still at the wrong end of the foodchain.
Another agency, so I have received confirmation, has stopped working for this extraordinary outfit but, as the whistle blows, the next one has lined up already, this time from the UK again, to collect the litter and transfer this into a shiny and exciting job, of course located in incredible India.
And the Colonel is still on the telephone stuttering and mumbling his useless and empty phrases to eager and unaware colleagues...
Prepare for a tough and rough awakening, the Sun Group holds clouds only for their unaware newcomers...also known as Expats.
Join Date: Feb 2001
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Just a note to those of you who read my little piece above, I hope it conveyed the fact that I love the country and the people, for all the imperfections and frustrations, and mostly experienced nothing but hospitality and kindness.
I also think Indians are some of the best people on earth to work with, and mostly when I 'phone a company and end up with an Indian in a call centre, I feel a sense of relief.
It was not meant to be in any way derogatory about India or her people, and I hope nobody took it that way. I can, when I wish, be very critical and negative and I do so without concern of being called 'racist' or anything else. In this case, there was no such intent.
I also think Indians are some of the best people on earth to work with, and mostly when I 'phone a company and end up with an Indian in a call centre, I feel a sense of relief.
It was not meant to be in any way derogatory about India or her people, and I hope nobody took it that way. I can, when I wish, be very critical and negative and I do so without concern of being called 'racist' or anything else. In this case, there was no such intent.
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Capetonian...
Extremely well-written article/diary. All of it rings true and all of it reminds we why I'll never, willingly, return to the sub-continent for a visit, for work, or for any reason. Decorum prevents me from getting into details, but your essay is a good start.
Extremely well-written article/diary. All of it rings true and all of it reminds we why I'll never, willingly, return to the sub-continent for a visit, for work, or for any reason. Decorum prevents me from getting into details, but your essay is a good start.
