Air India beats British Airways hands down

There is something to be said for flying the flag — and by that I mean travelling by Air India. I just returned to London after a brief holiday in India armed with two suitcases full of goodies for my family and to my relief as the conveyor belt at Heathrow airport began to roll, my cases were among the first to come out.

With the complete chaos at the world’s busiest international airport even after the new Terminal 5 was opened last month and the related horror stories, I was expecting that my bags would find themselves in another terminal, or worse still in another part of the country like thousands of others.

Unfortunately the worst affected airline in the Heathrow mess is British Airways. The company — touting itself as the ‘best airline in the world’ — lost its crown a long time ago. In fact, a minor mishap with staff or technology at Heathrow and BA flounders under the pressure.

More than 28,000 bags have been ‘lost’ ever since the £4.3 billion T5 was opened in March. Some are still waiting to be reunited with their owners, others are sitting in a warehouse in Italy, and some have even been sent for incineration. Under the Montreal convention on passenger rights the total amount of compensation a traveller is entitled to per lost bag is £850.

This in no way compensates for the harassment. So when I had the choice of flying BA or Air India direct to London from Kolkata, believe me there was no competition!

The Edinburgh Festival is the annual high-point of art and cultural life in the UK and for the first time this year Indian theatre groups will have a presence in the Fringe Festival. Entitled ‘InvAsian’, a new festival dedicated to pan-Asian culture will be a part of the almost a month-long festivities in Edinburgh. InvAsian will celebrate Asian music, dance, drama, film and art showcasing acts from India, Pakistan, China, Japan and Korea.

British Indian theatre companies like Kali Theatre, Tara Arts and Rifco Arts have been invited to take part as has the dance company Dance Ihayami. There is also going to be an Indian and Chinese Elvis to entertain the crowds.

The Festival is also looking to showcase a Bollywood film premiere. With three Fridays falling between August 3 to 25, I am sure there are plenty of producers in Mumbai who would love the honour of premiering at the Edinburgh Festival.

Magazines like Cosmopolitan, Vogue and Maxim have already launched their Indian editions, but now the famous men’s mag GQ is also set to capture the Indian market. Sanjiv Bhattacharya, a former features and contributing editor of the British GQ, will be editing the Indian edition.

Bhattacharya has been busy lately, working in America for the past eight years and contributing to the Los Angeles Times, Marie Claire, the Daily Telegraph and the Observer as well as completing a documentary for Channel 4.

Now he is off to Mumbai. Conde Nast which publishes GQ is extremely excited about the new India edition after their ‘overwhelming success’ with Vogue India, said its international chairman Jonathan Newhouse.