On an exciting October dawn in 1932, a Puss Moth and I soared joyfully from Karachi with our precious load of mail, on an inaugural flight to Bombay"... this is how JRD Tata had reminisced about the time he -- and India -- had touched the skies for the very first time. It was the pre-Independence era, exactly 72 years ago in 1932, when the small, 25-feet-long cabin monoplane landed in what is now known as Mumbai. Nobody except a visionary could perhaps think of the giant leap it was about to take. Yet, it was happening ... the largely unnoticed first flight from Karachi carrying a bagful of mails heralded the beginning of aviation the sector in the country.

"As we hummed towards our destination at a `dazzling' hundred miles an hour, I breathed a silent prayer for the success of our venture and for the safety of those who worked for it", JRD went on. "We were a small team in those days. We shared successes and failures, the joys and headaches, as together we built up the enterprise which later was to blossom into Air-India and Air-India International", he recalled.

This love of flying, then just a hobby, had grown on JRD in his boyhood days in Paris. He hero-worshiped Louis Bleriot, the first man to fly across the English Channel. JRD's first joyride came in 1919, at a young age of just 15. By the time he came to India, he held a firm belief that aviation was critical to India's progress. Thus came about Tata Airlines, in the form of a Tata Sons division, with an investment of Rs 2 lakh. It went public in 1946, and became a joint stock company and called Air-India Ltd. Passenger travel by air, then, had truly arrived in the country.

At first the airline got no financial help from the Government, only an extra four annas (a rupee then had 16 annas) air surcharge per letter, for which a postage stamp had to be affixed. Passengers often found themselves heels above head as they flew sitting atop mail bags in the two small, second-hand planes. Often in the monsoon times, the mud flat at Juhu would be flooded and JRD would shift the two planes, three pilots and three mechanics to Poona. From Karachi to Bombay and Madras, the airline soon expanded its destinations, adding Trivandrum, Goa and Cannanore, then Delhi-Bombay via Indore, Bhopal and Gwalior, and in 1938, even Colombo.

In the post-partition turmoil, the Tatas put up a proposal to the government in October 1947 that a service to Europe be started. They placed an order for three Lockheed Constellations, in the faith that the proposal would be approved. Though the sub-continent was convulsed with the Partition trauma, the Tatas' move was a measure of its immense faith in the newborn called India. The Tatas suggested that the Government take up a 49 per cent stake in the venture, while their own holding would be 25 per cent and the remaining be publicly subscribed. 

Further, the Government would have the right to buy another 2 per cent from the Tatas to take its own share up to 51 per cent take total control. Thus came about the country's first-ever public-private joint enterprise. Under the proposal, a new company was to formed by the name of Air-India International. The Tatas' domestic airline Air-India Ltd was to manage and provide it staff, maintenance and services. Finally, on June 8, 1948, the JRD dream went international and the famous Maharaja took wing to Europe.

It did not take the fledgling airline too long to establish itself as one of the finest carriers flying in the global skies. Year 1953 saw the Government deciding to nationalise the airlines, merging the two into a single corporation with JRD named Chairman. However, he dissuaded the Government from doing so, suggesting instead that the domestic and international airlines of the country ought to be kept apart and two separate corporations be formed.

This recommendation found favour with the Government, and JRD was invited to head the international airline. This task he accepted, and stayed at the helm of Air-India for the next 25 years as Chairman. He was also a member of the board of directors of Indian Airlines. Indeed, to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Air-India, JRD's indomitable spirit soared once more and he flew the refurbished Leopard Moth along the original route on October 15, 1982.

Times have changed since, with both the carriers facing tough competition from others; yet they have managed to hold their own and continue to play a significant role in the country's' aviation scene, carrying the bulk of air passengers in India and taking forward the vision of a far-sighted aviator who was also an Indian first.