Giving flight to hope

Here's hoping UDAN takes off, benefits fliers and the country's economy in more ways than one

On April 28, Prime Minister Narendra Modi flagged off the first flight of UDAN from Shimla, operated by Alliance Air. If the scheme works — and the government at least has put its best foot forward to make sure it does — it could add a new dimension to the aviation map of this country.

In the last couple of weeks, I met two people closely associated with the scheme: Jayant Sinha — who along with a couple of his senior officers — is the principal architect of the scheme, and Ajay Singh, chairman and managing director of SpiceJet, who