The country’s first Aviation Minister, Mr Karan Singh today opposed the merger of Air India and Indian Airlines, calling it a “very bad idea“. “To my mind, the merger was a very bad idea. The two airlines one based in Delhi and the other in Mumbai had different ethos, different philosophy,” he said while delivering the first Rajiv Gandhi Memorial Lecture organised by the Civil Aviation Ministry as per a PTI report.

He said a proposal for merging the two erstwhile state- run air carriers was “mooted even when I was a minister. But I firmly rejected it“. When a reaction was sought on Mr Karan Singh’s statement, the Civil Aviation Minister Mr Vayalar Ravi said “similar views have come to me from other quarters too”, while refusing to give his opinion on the issue.

Two major parliamentary panels —— the Standing Committee on Transport, Tourism and Culture and the Committee on Public Undertakings, have also expressed strong objection to the merger. Mr Karan Singh, who was the Minister of Tourism and Civil Aviation in 1971 when the Ministry came into being, said Air India was then under the leadership of JRD Tata and it was “one of the top five airlines in the world. I will not comment on where it is now“.