0:00 Mr. Malia is out of the country. Sicker Baron Vijay Malia who find himself in a raging 9,000 cr loan default scam. Welcome on figuring out sir. Why are you doing this after 9? In India public opinion is very quickly formed and influenced by the media pasa loot. Hi, I'm Vijay Malian. So it's not just huge, it is and nothing else comes close. King Fisher is a class apart. VJ Mallay is you were the biggest airline in the country. Welcome aboard King Fisher Airlines India's biggest airline going to be there amongst the best airlines in the world. What went wrong? So I went to
0:47 Shri Pranabokuji then finance minister of India. I have to downsize this aine. I was told not to downsize King Fisher at that time. You continue, banks will support you. That is how it all started. Kingfisher Airlines has been forced to suspend all of its flights. Kingfisher Airlines has been struggling. At the time when you asked loan, the company was not doing that great. Please never forget I gave my personal guarantee. So all this narrative of chore people give you this kind of loan against collateral. They took shares of King Visha Airlines at the double price. There's again a statement that your international employees were getting paid. Indian employees were not. The company in India had no money. It
1:34 was UB's money of 260 crores. With the bank under the control of the government of Canada court said no. Multiple international courts, Switzerland authorities, one of the courts from UK, they also found you guilty for misrepresentation of funds. Do you ever feel sorry that you couldn't do anything? I apologize publicly to everyone for the failure of King Airlines. Here's what pissed people off that in your private life you were enjoying. You had a grand birthday party, your 60th birthday party. Do you think you shouldn't have done that party? Why? Somebody mentioned that you took out €35 million and invested in buying
2:20 properties in France. Rubbish. What happened between 2012 and 2015? I made four settlement offers to the banks which they refused to accept. 2015 CBI started investigating you. They found you ciphering the money. Third March 2016 case needs to be heard or needs to be represented in front of Supreme Court. Second March you left the bank. On 15th April, your suspension came for your passport and 24th April was the revocation. Why didn't you reply? I'd like to show you something. Here is what is the biggest challenge of doing business in India? Government. It's in the Indian DNA. But how did you manage
3:05 that before? Would there ever be exchange under the table as well? I'm not going to confirm or deny that because I leave it to your imagination. How do you make money now? Do you feel restricted now? What's your biggest fear now? Are you prepared for the worst? Have you ever imagined yourself actually going to jail? Would you be willing to return to country if you're assured fair? If I am assured, absolutely. I will think about it seriously. But [Applause] this episode is not about glorifying a fugitive nor it is about justifying any wrongs. It's about asking the hard questions to the man at the center of one of the India's most controversial
3:51 financial stories. After 9 years of complete media silence, Vijay Malia chose our podcast figuring out to speak publicly for the first time. I didn't do this podcast to celebrate him. I did it because I was curious. I read his tweets. I heard the headlines, but I never heard the full side of the story because the tweets that he makes are different than what the headlines talk about him. There's a mismatch. As a podcaster, my job is to ask every uncomfortable question, and I did. Vijay Malia claims he never committed fraud. He says he wanted to pay back the loans, that his properties were seized and sold, and that he's being framed. He also says he's ready to face the
4:37 consequences, whatever they may be, if he's given the fair chance of trial. I've tried to cover his childhood, business building, the man behind the image, the rise, the fall, the good, the bad, and the ugly, the life before, and the life now. I'm not here to decide who's right or wrong. I trust the Indian judicial system to do that. This conversation is for those who want to listen, think and question. It's not about taking sides. It's about understanding all sides. Watch this episode with utmost sincerity and let me know in the comments what do you think. Welcome on figuring out sir. Thank you for doing this.
5:25 And my objective of this whole podcast is going to be that I want to know your side of story. There are so many things that we have heard. There are so many things which are probably right or wrong. I don't know what's going on. And I think apart from me, there are millions of Indians who want to know the same thing. You're highly talked about. I also feel that there are so many things which people have just heard and started building their own narrative about you. So I wanted to out of a in inquisitiveness, curiosity and b out of a responsibility I wanted to take this
6:10 forward. So thank you so much for doing this and thank you for giving us an opportunity. And the best thing which I really liked about this is when you came here and you said I'm ready to answer everything which you want to talk about. I don't think many people give that opportunity. So thank you for doing this. But the first question is why are you doing this after 9 years? There are thousands of people who must have reached out to you over the years. Why all of a sudden the need after 9 years that okay I'll say yes and yes to us. Why? Very good question. Nice place to start. For the last nine years, I have been the subject of a
6:56 vicious, relentless trial by media in India who as you have rightly pointed out have created so many narratives, negative narratives about me that I have become a lightning rod of public anger, being abused, called names, And that was very unfortunate both professionally and personally. So rather than try and take on this huge Indian media machine, I just prefer to keep quiet. Now, times have changed and I can't help but
7:44 recalling that when President Trump was inaugurated in the first press briefing by the White House press secretary, she said that a few seats were now going to be reserved for the very first time for people who represented new media or social media. I didn't even know that a podcast existed, let alone understanding what a podcast really meant until you told me and explained it to me in a manner that I got quite excited about because here is my opportunity to not only answer your
8:29 questions but to say things that I truly feel would never ever have been truthfully reported by the legacy media particularly in India. That's why I'm here. Why do you think nobody cared about hearing you then? In India, it's strange, but public opinion is very quickly formed and influenced by the media, more importantly by sensationalism. I still remember the anchor of one media channel in 2016 shouting and screaming on the
9:17 television saying, "VJ Malia, I want to see you in jail clothes. I want to see you eat jail food." With an image of me in um in jail attire. What for? I always wondered what for. Subsequently, nobody bothered to step back and think, but it was very easy to fling false accusations day after day and get away with it. One of the reasons I agreed to sit with you today
10:05 is also because it is only very recently that finally the government of India ministry of finance has published a report their annual report in which they have acknowledged 14,100 crores recovered from me. Of course, this was following the finance minister's statement in parliament and the legacy media can't argue with that anymore. They can't put any spin on it anymore. The debt recovery tribunal gave a judgment debt of 4,999 crores borrowed by kingfisher airlines not by Vijay Malia borrowed by kingfisher airlines of
10:52 which Vijay Malia was one of the guarantors so what is the DRT judgment debt 4,999 crores plus 1,23 crores unapplied interest. Okay, which means notional interest that the banks had not even booked. Forget that the total of the unapplied interest and the principal was 6203 crores. Okay. And I was a guarantor. The government has recovered 14,100 crores from me. right now if I had done chi if I
11:37 had duped the banks where does this all add up till re very recently there was absolutely no official figure of recovery right so everybody the legacy media in particular wrote whatever they Ed right and I was in no position to contradict today after the government of India has acknowledged the recovery of 14,100 crores I think it's my turn to ask them what they have to say about it because you say that a lot of things about you are false narrative let's go down to from your childhood we speak from the
12:24 beginning and you tell me everything that people have been said people think it's wrong and I'll try to present the facts and the narratives which I have heard and which I have gathered through my research. All right. And if you're okay with counter somewhere, I'll counter you as well. No, please, please feel free to counter me. If there's something that you feel is debatable or you want to make a counterpoint, I'm ready for it. Perfect. because I feel that's my little responsibility out there to to hear the right side and the wrong side both and let then people think about it and let them make the right call. That's fair. Perfect. So before even I ask you about childhood do you do you regret anything? I regret one
13:10 thing which is that after all my hard work, all the value that I created in so many multiple ways that effectively the government of India and of course the media made me a zero from a hero and that's a fact of life that I have had to stomach and live with. Now whether that was justified or not is something that I'm sure will be encompassed in your own questions. Zero from a hero. Let's talk about building of a hero first and we'll come down to zero
13:55 again. So before the billionaire Vijay Malia, before the controversy, before all of this flamboyance and scandals and things that people talk about, who was Vijay Malia as a child? Where were you born? What did you do? How was your childhood? Tell me about it. Born in Kolkata, moved to a hometown Bangalore. Went back to Kolkata. did my schooling there, did my college education there in Kolkata and my upbringing under my father was a very normal I would say strict upbringing really. Yes. Tell me an incident strict
14:41 childhood. Two things. When I was still in school, class nine at La Martineer in Kolkata, my marks were not very good in class. I was a mid-ranker only because I took a lot of interest in sport and extracurricular activities. I didn't I you know concentrate fully on studies and my mark sheets. And he told me and I think most people know it. He was exceptionally intelligent. Uh was a product of the Dune School. I think topped his class. So he expected me to also top my class. Uh nevertheless he said something to me
15:29 which I think I remember till today. Two things made a profound impact. one, if you're not good enough, you are not going to step into my shoes. And the second thing he said, he said, "Do you realize that while I say step into my shoes, there may not be any shoes at all because the government and its then socialist policies may have taken everything away from us and the only thing I can leave to you is your education. So take it seriously." I think I repaid some amount
16:16 of faith because um for my last three years in school 9 10 11 I think I came within the top three in class and he was quite happy about that. So weren't you a little spoiled as child spoiled? Oh my god. I was anything but spoiled really. You had all the fancy toys. You had all the things that Absolutely no fancy toys at all. That's completely false narrative. I after I passed out of school and when I went to San Javier's college to study BCOM, my father was very clear, you go to college at 6:00 in the morning and when you finish at
17:02 10:30, you go and work a full day at the office as a management trainee. I was put on a stipend of 400 rupees a month and that 400 rupees never increased right the way my time through college. So that's all I got 400 rupees a month and was working in those days fips and company limited old courthouse street in Kolkata every day after college. Aren't there stories that you used to go to college in a very fancy car and you removed the silencer just to show the the noise of your car, the loudness of your car and you were always a show off, weren't you? I was no showoff at all.
17:48 And the fancy car that I have was a secondhand standard herald. So where are these stories coming from? I don't know. People's narratives, people's perceptions. That's why it's important to correct those perceptions. You know, talking about noise, even a fat fat in Delhi makes a hell of a lot of noise. You don't have to drive a fancy car to make a noise down the street. So, you are telling me that all these stories of you having a you having fancy toys, remote control cars, and then fancy cars with loud noises, all of this is false. Well, I may have tempered with the silencer of my car. Okay. Uh because
18:34 I was always into kind of fast cars, loved motor racing and stuff like that, but you know, I mean, it still remained a standard held. But why did you do that? Like just to show off like the noise and everything. Look, if you can modify the silencer of a car like you can modify the the top end of a car's engine to make it go a little quicker. I mean that's some that's the basics of of motorsport. But how were you as a child like personalitywise? Were you confident? Were you a little arrogant? No. No. I look the this is all a question of perception. Uh arrogant is also your understanding of arrogance. My understanding of arrogance. But I'll tell you one thing.
19:20 H I was always self-confident and whenever I was invited to give talks at various universities and educational establishments I always told the youngsters that when they start off life they must be self-confidence because it is only self-confidence that will bring out the best in you and I still believe that till today and because I started young I am passionate about youth empowerment but this would have not been the case always as a kid we all have like lot of insecurities it's not always confidence what was your biggest insecurity when you were growing up I
20:09 don't yeah probably the biggest inse insecurity was when u the examination results with you and what my dad would have to say about But no beyond that uh you know my life is pretty plain and simple um great bunch of school friends, great bunch of college buddies um in Kolkata. uh not the glitzy lights of Bombay and yeah so it was pretty normal but you know nothing fancy but I had a very strict set of supervisors at work who were clearly instructed by my father to be tough with me to make sure you know I worked my butt off and I'm none
20:56 the happier for it that's what made me but did you did you ever get to a position or in a thinking as a child that one day I'll be powerful, one day I'll be very rich? No, absolutely not. I mean, how could I be so presumptuous? Here I had a dad who was hands-on working 24/7 uh young uh and and uh who told me that if I didn't measure up, I'd have no place in the business. So I couldn't be presumptive could I? But your father was a wealthy man. In those times there were only few wealthy people. So you would pres presume this right? Like I will
21:42 have all this wealth inherited. I'll be maybe bigger than my father or maybe just have all of these things. I didn't have any such aspirations in those days. Uh and and you know wealth was something that was very relative. Um and and my father certainly was a very frugal spender. So uh irrespective of how much wealth he had, he certainly wasn't expensive. You said when you used to go to work, your father put strict supervisors. Mhm. Right. What would those strict supervisors made made you do? What? Well, first of all, make sure that I came to the office on time, straight after college. It wasn't as if I'd sort of roll up whenever I wanted to. Okay.
22:28 The second I was given a clear set of tasks. Um I was a salesman. I had to go and visit the shops in the market. I had to visit distributors. Um I had to uh spend time with the accounts department to understand accounting, corporate accounting. Um yeah, and marketing, you know, sit with the ad agencies and stuff like that. So it was a comprehensive training program but with no forgiveness in any sense. I had to work a full day. I couldn't sort of get up and go uh or come when I liked which was fine. I mean um looking back it was a great grounding. What happened next? So you were in
23:14 Xavier's you started going to work and then you went to states. Yeah my dad sent me off to the states to work for American H. Okay. American Herx as it was then known became then Aventus and now the pharmaceutical company the global companies called Sanopi. So yeah I was sent there uh worked there once again um as a management traininee. I then was brought to England to work in Jensen and Nicholson. I was a paint foreman in the paint factory. used to be mixing paint at night and yeah I mean slowly I understood what my father's methods were
24:00 what were his method which is basically a strict training regimen and I did pretty well because I can tell you he he expressed he expressed um his his appreciation for my work. I got a a pretty good uh report card from America. He was he said he was proud of me. Um I did well here in England mixing paint and um when I went back to India um his health was becoming indifferent even though he at that time he was only 57 years old. His health was becoming indifferent. he had a history of heart
24:48 disease. So he sort of got me to work uh for him in the core business and um yeah then of course the story of Kingfisher the story of McDonald's number one backpiper and all these brands that subsequently became very wellnown began then. How was your relationship with your father? The relationship with my father was excellent. He was a man of few words. Uh but there's one thing he did which embarrassed me no end. That every time he saw me, he gave me a big kiss on my cheek. Whether it was at an airport
25:35 or in the office or at home, he'd give me a hug and a big kiss on the cheek. I mean bless him for that. Was he did he ever doubt you that you will be able whether you will be able to continue and build his legacy or not? I think the biggest certificate I got was from my bosses in America and they gave me a pretty good certificate a pretty good report and that finally I think gave him the confidence to say ah my son is stepping up to my expectations. What was your first bold step in your father's company? Oh, King Fisher. I went to my father and I said, "I need 10 lakhs rupees to
26:21 market Kingfisher beer." He said, "That's a princely sum of money. What are you going to do with it? How are you going to do it? Etc., etc." Because I saw in the archives of United Breweries this label of King Fusha Beer, which had been actually launched in 1857, okay? gathering dust and you know with a pretty archaic kingfisher bird on it sort of prehistoric version but I said to myself the the mere word brand kingfisher is very evocative in so many ways it could be made into a fun brand. Now my time in Kolkata going back to my training days when I spent time with them with the marketing department more
27:09 importantly interacted with the people in the advertising agencies. my time in America where um you know I still remember the two big banks which is Bank of America and City Banks and City Bank said the city never sleeps and Bank of America came out saying we caught the city napping you know that was the level of marketing advertising tongue-in-cheek stuff which caught your attention and so I became fascinated with marketing And I came away back to India started working in the business and I always said a brand needs a personality. Of
27:54 course I very quickly realized in India I couldn't replicate what they did in America because for alcohol India is a media dark environment where the the advertising of alcohol is banned. So in a way I had to think of ways of authoring surrogate advertising uh which I did pretty successfully you know not some Mickey Mouse stuff where if you want to advertise an alcoholic brand that you sort of suddenly you know produce some music cassettes and I built a full water business around Kingfisher and a bought a business of
28:41 sign significant enough size uh that you could justify advertising it. Okay. And therefore you you advertise the core brand. So I gave King Fisher a very colorful personality because that's what evokes you know like Magdal number one golden moments Magdal moments it's evocative it's supposed to convey that you know if you want to hang out and have a good time with your friend golden moments well it's the Macdonald moment. So there were many
29:27 many such examples of how I actually gave brands their personalities and in many ways I supplemented by becoming the brand ambassador myself and all of this was happening when your father was still alive. Oh absolutely absolutely. You said India was media dark when it comes to alcohol which still is the reality and there was a point where I think government banned alcohol. No, no, no, no. Or what was that? Certain states introduced prohibition such as Andhra Pradesh, unified Andhra Pradesh. Of course, Gujarat has always been dry.
30:13 But the advertise advertising of alcohol is banned in India and has been banned and still is banned. When was that? When was this time when you started acquiring a lot of alcohol brands? uh because a lot of those brands were scared of the state because the state were was getting involved in the alcohol business or maybe they wanted to ban or prohibit certain things. What was this time where you started acquiring certain alcohol brands and cheap because you and your father was bullish on it. No, that was in 1977 when Majaraji Desai was the prime minister of India and he publicly announced that there should be prohibition all India. Okay. Okay. which means that alcohol should be banned across the country. So obviously the
31:00 stocks the value of the stocks and shares of almost all alcoholic beverage companies whether distilleries or breweries fell. M my father was very clear that prohibition could never succeed in India and therefore he bought and so that's how we became number one by quite a fair distance because all those who panicked and sold out my father acquired. But was there something you guys knew which others didn't or it was just pure conviction? No, it was just pure conviction because we knew that uh prohibition had not even succeeded in the United States. And plus, if you look
31:47 at the amount of revenue generation for the state governments through the sale of alcohol, there's no way in the world that prohibition would have succeeded in India. What h what happened after your father's death? You were doing this successful stint. You were taking bold steps. You wanted to make alcohol a cool brand. All of this is happening. Everything was going right. Right. What happened then? Well, um I was in I was in the US. I gone to finalize promotion and export of Black Dog Scotch whiskey. uh when my father sadly passed away at a
32:33 cocktail party in in then Bombay and he was only 59. Uh nobody ever expected him to pass so young. I was just past 27. So I took the air and death flight and flew back from New York and performed my father's last rights. Then the fun began because my father surrounded himself with a few stalwarts. Yeah. Meaning people who he put in positions of great
33:20 authority who were also very close to him personally. So he had somebody running the western India businesses, somebody running the eastern India businesses, somebody running the southern India businesses. And don't ever forget in those days the structure was that United Breweries Limited was the the holding company and the other companies in the group were largely controlled by its largest shareholder United Breweries or they were subsidiary companies. And so the inevitable debate started on what
34:07 next, what role I should have. Of course, people acknowledged that I was in the business. Uh but people I think were a little reticent to speak openly about uh their own aspirations of being the chairman. Then something very funny happened. We had uh annual general meeting of shareholders that uh was coming due. Mhm. And the shareholders in the front line who had seen me with my dad proposed my name and that's how all other aspirants were
34:53 silenced because they couldn't publicly sort of get up and say that they were more qualified particularly when it was evident I had shareholder support. M and there I was. I was installed in what I call the hot seat at a very young age. But fortunately, thanks to my upbringing, my father's insistence on proper training, familiarization with the business, time in America, time working with him. I wasn't raw. I had a fair amount under my belt to be able to address the challenge of the role. I was reading an article where
35:42 u it said that you didn't trust people who was who were in control at the time of your father's uh when your father was a chairman. So that's why you hired your people and your friends because you didn't know that if you could actually go to them for the right advice or no. No, no, no. That's completely misleading. It's false. I never hired any of my friends. But let's put it this way. They would have been too young and inexperienced. In any case, you know, I mean, as I said, I was barely 28. They would be my contemporaries. M so the question of hiring them and putting them in management positions just didn't arise but I encouraged a lot of professional from within I mean people
36:30 who then became the president of the spirits division of the breweries division and all the rest of it I mean my father's time the average age of the regional directors of the regional satrups was probably around 60 between 60 and 65 and in In five years after I reorganized, I mean the average age was about 40. Okay. And these were all professional managers promoted from within the ranks. I mean yes there were couple of exceptions where I hired people from extremely well-known organizations uh like major consultancy firms so on so forth but beyond that largely it was all internal promotion.
37:16 compare or give me differences between before okay so when your father was the chairman versus when you were the chairman give me three four differences what happened in United briefies it was the entire approach for instance mine was a decentralized accountability approach okay uh I would have monthly operating review meetings called MS for each line of business. Okay. And that's all I wanted to know about how the businesses were performing on a regular day-to-day basis. I wasn't leaning over the shoulders of the management team and trying to
38:03 micromanage things. Um when opportunities came along, uh then of course we'd had separate discussions. So if you empower people, accountability comes along with it because people are also motivated to demonstrate their own capabilities. Now my father's style was as I said far more hands-on owner operated micromanaging management style and he spent a lot of time doing it. Um I had a lot of free time. Um as I will tell you as we proceed because because of this
38:48 decentralization and this whole new management culture Mhm. that I had enough time in your um introduced in in the UB group and this was between let's say 1983 and 1986 87 that is why I was able to then acquire the Burgger paints global business based here in the UK and actually become a non-resident Indian in ' 86 88 8 Okay Yeah. And I still have a letter from the Reserve Bank of India confirming that from 1988 I would be treated as a non-resident Indian
39:33 uh for tax and exchange control purposes. And the reason I and of course that obviously meant that I couldn't spend more than 180 days in India. Mhm. Well, the luxury of spending 180 days out of India running this new opportunity in international business means business. Uh I was able to do it only because of the decentralized management structure implemented in India. So both the foreign businesses and the Indian businesses ran very well. Give me differences and similarities between Vital Malia and Vijay Malia. Well, Vital Malia's
40:21 thought 100 times about spending money. Vijay Malia probably thought twice. Um yeah, you know, I guess it's age. Um it's aspiration, its age, it's different styles and outlook on life. Was there any difference in terms of public attention as well? You were pretty loud. Your personality was I No, look, once again, you can think whatever you want to think of me and so can the whole world. Just because I'm a self-confident guy who is not afraid of public speaking who doesn't suffer from stage
41:08 fright. If you want to say that I am arrogant, flamboyant, go ahead and say it. I can't deny it. My father was very shy of public speaking. Totally the opposite. I am a very confident public speaker. I used to debate in school. I used to participate in drama in school. So I can speak. So you didn't want public recognition. You loved speaking. No. Well, if somebody asked me a question or I was invited to speak, I'd speak and people would well in some cases tell me I'm talking nonsense and in most cases say
41:53 they liked my speak. But I was able to communicate from a platform. But won't you speak certain things and tweak your speeches in a way that that becomes headlines? I never looked for headlines. I never ever looked for headlines. The headlines were created around me by the media. You know, let's take the case of flamboyance. Okay? And let's spend a minute on analyzing flamboyance. To me, flamboyance means loving life and appreciating the good things in life. That's what flamboyance is.
42:39 In a public way. Okay. That is what I would say is the meaning of lambards. How old was I when my father died? 28. Compare me to other industrialists in India at that time. I was 28. I was chairman of UB group. Who was chairman of RPG enterprises? Mr. Ra Prasad. Who was the chairman of Reliance? Dhubayani. who was the uh chairman of the Brila group Mr. BK Bella I was a contemporary of their children but I was thrown into the deep end. So I
43:26 was a group chairman being compared to people who were my father's age. Now as a youngster I had the the passions of young people like I enjoyed a good car. I enjoyed my drinks. I enjoyed parties. I enjoyed music. I enjoyed sport. Not all of my father's contemporaries who suddenly became my contemporaries in business lived that way. They were more conservative, you know, more at home, more domestic, consistent with their own
44:13 age. So suddenly the media decided, huh, this guy, chairman of UB group, is flamboyant. I was flam termed flamboyant only because I did what every other youngster aspired to do. You know, I mean, at the end of the day, you have to make allowances, age related allowances. Let's put it that way. But it's okay. I have no regrets. I I didn't I didn't spend anybody else's money. I spent my own money. I lived my life the way I wanted to live my life. Uh if I look back, I've got millions of miles of corporate experience under my belt
44:59 starting off at a very young age and um I hope people appreciate the more positive contributions that I have made rather than the persistently negative narrative that has overtaken and overshadowed a effectively a whole career. I don't think I ever use that word flamboy. It was the media and the narrative they created around me that was flamboyant for their own purposes. Now I just lived like any other moderately wealthy 28 year old would live. No. Yeah. extraordinary
45:46 life. How can it be extraordinary? In what way? Do you know what the exchange controls were in India? Do you know if you could import a Ferrari in India? Today you can. But go back to the 198586. Could you import a Ferrari? No way in the world. So did you or did you not? You could only buy cars from the state trading corporation through an auction process in Delhi. But you ended up buying all of them. I could not. later you bought it. Look, I like good cars. I race cars. I've been racing cars since I was a teenager. Okay, I brought a Formula 1 car into India to race. Okay, when my father was still alive. In fact, when I won the race at
46:31 Scholabaram, okay, near then Madras, now Chennai, I called him from the racetrack and said, "I won the race." He was very happy. So it wasn't as if I was trying to do things behind people's back. But okay, I was fond of motorsports back then. Okay. So it came from media. But did you enjoy the tag of your Where did I have the time to enjoy or spend my time and energy denying? I just lived my life, did my work. And I think whoever you may ask I work really hard. See this is very okay this is very like a media answer. Okay. U what did you were aware
47:19 that people call you Flip Point. You were aware that this was the image built being built. You were aware that headline. What was your reaction? What did you start secretly? Did you enjoy it? No way. So what was the reaction the moment people would write it you like ignore it? Of course I would ignore it. What have I done for the last 9 years? But at that time you peak you let me tell you something being referred to as flamboyant some people may take as a compliment but nobody will tolerate being called chore, thief, fugitive. Right? These are damning words. I ignored all of it because I
48:04 knew I couldn't fight it much like I ignored flamboyance. I couldn't spend all my time devoted to contradicting what the media wrote. Yeah. And now but okay let me also tell you I referred to earlier I said you know this whole theme of flamboyance the media if you'd see the pattern of their reportage on me okay I mean and they kept on writing things which really I thought these guys don't have anything better to do vija party vijay mala is hosting Newest party at
48:50 King Fishella Vij Malia is doing this that and other things. Okay. Bottom line is they created a narrative of a personality that helped them to sell their own media. One day there was a terribly wrong factually incorrect uh article in one of the large newspapers in India. So I called the owner. Yes. How could you possibly publish something like this without checking the facts? Vijay, sorry. Your name sells. So they created this animal called Vijay Malia whose name started
49:37 selling so they could they could they could they could you know get more eyeballs, more readership, more viewership. But be that as it may, I lived my life. What was my objectives? I am not apologetic for the life I lived because I didn't spend anybody else's money except my own. I didn't borrow one rupee from anybody. Okay? I was much maligned, much complimented, but effectively I was my own brand
50:22 ambassador. Take the case of one muchtalked about phrase, king of good times. Yeah. I'm not crazy to walk around with a label on my chest saying king of good times read. And this is where somebody must make the effort. See the label of the king vishab beia that was developed. It says the king of good times. The personality of King Fisher Bear was the king of good times. Ulta media started calling me the king of good
51:09 times. So tell me being the king of good times will not help sell the beer. But it did the because the beer itself was the genuine king of good times. And the personality that I gave King Fisher, promoting sport, promoting fashion, promoting music, sponsoring motor racing. So all the stuff that's exciting to youngsters that represented the personality of the King Fisher brand. That's why King Fisher was such a success. But talk to me about building of King Fisher. Don't you think it was a like at least that's what I think it was a very well curated
51:56 strategy that I will become a brand which represents King Fisher. No, I was brand ambassador and I have done it not only for King Fisher but take the case of our spirits business. I actually came on national television with an ad encouraging people not to drink and drive. I did it myself. I didn't get some film star to do it. I did it myself. So bu becoming a personal brand was a strategy then. Of course it was. So then why does it bother you that you wouldn't bother me act as like the king of bothered me? But that's what I'm saying. But I am not the
52:42 person who labeled myself as king of good times. You happened that the media started calling me the king of good times. Fine because subtly you c curated this. No, I didn't curate king of good times. In what way? By actually promoting a lifestyle which every young person would aspire to. Why not? People young people are entitled to aspirations. M young people are entitled to improve lifestyles. Young people are entitled to to treat themselves. Um yeah, but that doesn't mean I went around the whole world saying, "Well, you know what? I'm the king of good times." No way. Never said it even once. But you knew it will happen. No, I
53:28 didn't. How should I care? I achieved my objective of making King the number one selling beer. That's it. How did that happen? What happened along the way is is irrelevant. Okay. How did this happen? King Fisher beer. How did it become number one? Tell me story of King Fisher. Well, when I took over this business, Golden Eagle or Mo Breweries was the largest beer company in India. Today, United Breweries Limited controls almost 52% of the beer market in India. King Fisher is is I mean not very many product categories that can can lay claim to 52% market national market share but yeah Kingfisher is by far the
54:14 number one selling brand that's because yes I cured a personality around Kingfisher around fun around excitement around vibrancy color I created the brand and I achieved my objective you take the case of of of Mcdal number one. I mean once again this whole golden moments, Mcdal moments, right? Uh it was a little more sober than the Kingfisher ads because the target demographic was different but it's the largest selling whiskey in the world today. Number one, right? All these brands I created.
55:01 Tell me one turning point which just made everything good for you in King Fisher. Kingfisher beer specifically. It's a sustained effort. But what was when was the first time you thought okay now it'll work because it was always working it as the from day one. Yeah. When I relaunched it new packaging, right? Make it more appealing on the shelf. uh started sponsoring music, fashion, events, got more brand attention. Automatically the sales started picking up and then you know as we went along promoting our marketing strategy which was clearly effective,
55:46 the sales followed. Same thing with with Macdonald number one whiskey. Nothing is overnight. National brands are not built overnight. There wasn't one moment that you could point pinpoint or was it? How can you how can you pinpoint a moment because it isn't like switching on and off a light switch. Why did you get conviction that King Bishop beer will work because it was little expensive than other ones. We had brands such as UB Royal, Flying Horse, we had Jubilee. Now you tell me even though they were my brands, does any one of these evoke any excitement in you? No. But if I say to
56:34 you King Fisher, I mean you take notice, right? So that's the platform I built on. All right. Similarly, I said I mean you take the case of of Macdonald number one, right? It was uh targeted at uh slightly higher demographic, but it went along with more sophisticated um uh merchandising and stuff like that which which which ordered well for the brand. And today as the Indian economy has grown as consumer spending power has gone up it's the world's biggest brand selling about 32 million cases per year. What was the biggest challenge in
57:21 building of King Fisher bec I think or everything was just painted red and it worked out for you. No no there was nothing red about Macdonald. It was all black and gold. Uh the only one around that's red is King Fisher. No, I think more than challenges I look at opportunities. I mean you know 2005 I bought Shawless my biggest competitor. I mean that propelled the spirits business I mean to number one position by far brought on board banks like Royal Challenge and all the rest of it. So I mean those were pretty bold business decisions which
58:06 once again self-confidence. I had to pay $300 million for the company. Big amount of money but made it work. That's how United Spirits was created today with a market cap of almost one lakh crores. So you know I mean she had the confidence to do it. You go do it. You said you bought Bojo paints at the same time. talk about that. Why paints all of a sudden you were making money with alcohol? You were minting profits out of alcohol. You were convinced that brands like King Fisher and then at one point other brands as well would work out really well, which it did. Why buying a paint business like this is so
58:54 the paint British paints in India. Okay. which is now called Burgger Paintants was part of the Hex Group. My father was chairman of British Paints India. Okay. When he passed away, I became chairman of British Paints India. During my tenure as chairman of British Paints India, I learned something about the paint business. Right. Now, what did you learn about paint business? Go back in time what I told you. When I was
59:40 sent to America, then to England, I worked as a foreman in the Ber Jensen Nicholson paint factory here in this country. So I not only knew about making paint but also how a paint business was run because I was chairman of budgets. So when Hex Group decided to sell their global budget pens, headquartered in England, operating in the Caribbean, operating in Africa, in uh Asia, the true multinational company. Uh I went to them and put together a
1:00:27 um loan package with those days the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation and bought it because I had this aspiration of creating India's first multinational that was back yeah I said 1988. Okay. So from being a Indiancentric business I was operating in 25 countries worldwide flying the Indian flag. So your objective is only that I want to take India or Indian business to the world. No absolutely not. I I I I was was
1:01:14 uh very focused on making a hefty profit out of it too. All right. Uh which I successfully did. So I bought it in a leverage buyout. Mhm. And after that I did IPOs. I did IPOs in Jamaica. I did IPOs on the Kenyan Stock Exchange. I did an IPO on the Singapore Stock Exchange and diluted our shareholding to 51%. But used the proceeds of the IPO to pay down the debt, right? And then finally in 1996, I sold the entire business that was then listed on the Singapore Stock
1:01:59 Exchange and I made a fat profit. And I still remember and I have no hesitation in saying this that I went to my mom and I said, "You see this piece of paper? This is what I earned. This is not inherited. I made it myself. So when I spend it, don't complain." And that's on a lighter end. Yeah, I mean I I I that was when as a non-resident Indian I made my first serious piece of money out of entirely my own initiative in a pence environment. But hey, that's is what
1:02:46 it's all about. I mean I got experience of doing IPOs in three different countries across the globe. That was in invaluable experience. Do you regret selling it? Because today BGER is I think 60 70,000 cr big business. That's only one BGER in India. I own the global BGER all over the world including India. I sold Bger paints in India to dingas. So do you regret selling? A great job with it. No, God bless them. They did a super job with it. But it was if it was doing so good, why did you sell it then? Well, uh, it was bought by the Malaysians. Okay. And they came with an offer I couldn't refuse. I mean, okay. They
1:03:31 offered me some two and a half times the quoted shapers. Okay. You mentioned that you said you told your mother that I made this profit. Now don't complain when I spend it. Correct. Tell me about relationship with your mother. My mom brought me up. I used to live with her in Kolkata alone since ' 64 65 and yeah so she's stood by me like a rock she's a very well educated lady um and yeah I mean she's been living in England now for 30 plus years but yeah I mean you know I mean I wanted to buy a yacht I wanted to buy a plane and stuff
1:04:18 like like that. And so I wanted to make sure I set the record straight. I told my mom I earned this money. So if I spend it buying a yacht and spend it buying a plane, don't complain. Did she complain? Oh, no. Never. But why did you say that? She enjoyed the art. What? Okay. Why did you say this to her then? Was she like frugal? She would ask you not to spend. No, it isn't that. I mean it's natural for a parent you know if you see something that's quite extraordinary quite expensive lavish call it what you may it's normal parental reaction to ask the child you know why you spending money or whatever so I mean I'm just telling you I made a joke out of it but I was very proud that
1:05:04 that was money I earned you know it wasn't money I inherited it. Tell me one lesson you learned from your mom. Oh, I've learned many lessons from my mom. Don't waste time and life arguing. It's not worth it. Use your time productively. Think positively. Don't keep arguing with people unless it's a matter that's going to get you somewhere. And which argument gets you anywhere. And what did you learn from your father? Give me one lesson. Something that you can't forget.
1:05:52 Hard work and an ability to read a balance sheet. Company balance sheet. He was really good at it. Right. That's what it's written about him. Super little at it. Do you miss your I don't think I'd be I'd be as good but I think whatever I learned from him was good enough for me to produce some excellent robust balance sheets in all the companies I ran. Do you miss him? Well, who doesn't miss a dad? But you know it's now what 1983 to 2025 is a long time. What do you miss about him? You can't keep missing somebody for 40 years. Life is too short for that. But
1:06:37 do you think he would have been proud of you today? Well, I would hope so. Certainly not proud of me being called chore or and certainly nobody would be proud of that. Certainly no parent. I know my mother gets very agitated even today. She's 98 years old and every time she sees the Indian media, she's reduced to tears. Obviously, it hurts her more. I'm probably more thick skinned, more robust and I just ignore it. But, you know, at that age, my mother doesn't and it's very unfair what has been written, what has been alleged because it's complete nonsense. Let's walk through the case. Let's start from the point of what
1:07:22 happened in Kingfisher Airlines. Okay. When did you decide that you want to start a kingfisher a 2002 2003 and you just Okay. So here's a story. Hear me out. What I've gathered from reading about it is one day out of blue you go to an AGM or like just a board meeting I think not AGM it was a board meeting where you announced that on my son's birthday we are going to launch Kingfisher Airlines your CFO was not happy about it but you still pursued and you want to do it this was the this is what is reported What was the reality? Tell me the truth.
1:08:08 The truth is that Damana brothers from Bombay. Mhm. Who previously had Damana Airlines M came and made a presentation to my CFO Ravin Aruni saying the time is ripe to start an airline now. Okay. Ravender had discussions with them came to me and said would you like to look at this proposal? I said yes. We looked at it and finally we decided yes it is opportune so let's go for it. Okay. That's how the idea of an airline was
1:08:54 bomb and then you didn't take anyone in confidence. You were just hey out of nowhere I think we are alcohol business now we want an airline business. No there's nothing wrong in diversification. The UB group has had a history even during my father's time of operating food processing companies. petrochemical companies, electromechanical companies. So I mean diversity was nothing new to us. So your initial plan to launch an airline was 7th May 2005 but you ended up launching on 9th May 2005 right and then this whole business of launch on son's birthday as a birthday gift and all is
1:09:40 complete baloney. All right. I think my son would be embarrassed and I would be equally embarrassed to say I'm starting an airline. All right. As an 18th birthday gift. Complete nonsense. All right. But okay. Once again, media narratives are best ignored. A fullblown professional management team was in position before the airline even started before the first plane arrived. Okay. The CEO and the director of engineering were both hired from the US. Okay. And the airline was launched.
1:10:27 There's a lot of narrative about Kingfish Airlines. There's a lot of narrative about mismanagement. A lot of narrative about the Dean acquisition. All sorts of things. Let's pick one by one. What was the first vision of King Visher Airlines when you were starting in 2005? To produce the best flying experience that India had ever seen. Make it a premium experience. totally a premium experience number one terms of passenger comfort, safety, number two to connect places in India that had never ever been connected before and that it was a really serious part of the growing infrastructural needs of the country.
1:11:14 Hm. But I was watching one documentary about you and I think the person who you got to lead was Alex. Yeah. Will Cox. Yeah. So Alex said that you convinced him that you want to build a lowc cost carrier but it was not like that. And in your own words, if you're giving a vision that I want to build a premium experience, why did you get a CEO or like a president, I don't know what was his position, but somebody to lead by telling him that you want to build a lowc cost carrier. That is your own misinformation. He said it somewhere. I'm not I'm just
1:12:01 quoting him. Fair enough. I haven't seen it, but I'll respond. Kingfisher Airlines started off as a singleass airline, low cost but with a difference. It had inflight entertainment and it offered meals. Everything else that's applicable to a lowcost airline was applied to King Fisher as well. commonality of fleet, commonality of training, the whole lot. I mean there's a whole set of rules. What is a lowcost carrier? What is a full service carrier? Right? And that even descends down to intricacies such as the type of reservation system,
1:12:48 flight planning system you use and all the rest of it. So Kingfisher had all the lowcost attributes. Okay. The only product plus was inflight entertainment for the first time ever in India and good food. So to me the logic from my marketing experience was Indians love entertainment therefore the inflight entertainment system and Indians love food. M so good food right and then of course okay service quality whether whether you're a low cost or a full service I mean you'd like a nice well trained polite set of crew and we spent a lot of time and energy on
1:13:33 that then when we saw the market evolve we added king fisher first which is basically the business class. Why? Because the market demanded that on certain routes, right? There's certain people who would not fly King Fisher because we didn't have a front cabin or a business class who would always fly jet. Okay? Because Jet had two class, business class and economy class, right? And now just to prove my point, Indigo is often referred to as the most successful lowcost carrier in
1:14:18 the world and certainly the largest lowc cost carrier in India. What's Indigo doing now? Installing a business class. Right. Yeah. So it's not such a dumb idea. Right. So it worked in your favor initially. Yes. So by and by 2008 you were the biggest airline in the country having a 27% market share. Yes. Right. What went wrong? If things were right, your marketing was working, you had everything right. In fact before even you answer that I want to go to which is often talked about is your training of cabin crew. What was the idea behind that? you selected
1:15:04 certain people based on how they look or how they're going to be presented. Yeah. Well, you know, I mean, at the end of the day, you have you have very good-looking ladies who sadly can't speak very well. Now, what is one of the key attributes of a cabin crew? Communication. I mean you may look good but if you can't communicate with the passenger that doesn't serve the purpose the kind of service standards that I set for the airline and my service standards were unique they included in business class the
1:15:51 aeroses cleaning the reading glasses and spectacles of our customers. We call them guests, right? So there were little things that made a vast difference in the customer experience. Tell me two more thing. Two, two, three more things. This is one. Okay. Secondly, the food was second to none. Right. I mean the quality of the seats themselves, the recline and all the rest of it, what they call the seat pitch, it's second to none. So there was so many little attributes. We called customers not passengers but guests. Many airlines have copied us since but
1:16:36 they were the little little things that made a difference. I was very focused on the service delivery excellence of King Krishna. You can go further because you don't know this. You can't ask me the question. So let me tell you. Yeah. In the first one year, the airport manager at every single airport in India had to send me on my personal mobile and SMS the flight number, the schedule time of departure and the actual departure time. So every night before I went to bed which was rather late I used to look at my phone every single flight of King Fisher of that day I used to monitor
1:17:21 personally the on-time performance. You were so detailed focused. You were so because the the service industry in the airline industry requires focus requires detailed focus. So agreed then it worked in your favor till 2008. What happened then? Simple. You ever heard of Lemon Brothers? Yeah. You ever heard of the global financial crisis, right? Did it not impact India? Of course it did. The whole aviation sector was forget aviation. Every sector every sector was. Yeah. The money stopped. It got dry. The value of the Indian rupee. So I went to Shri Pranab Mukhuji then finance minister of
1:18:07 India having grown up in Kolkata. I speak fairly decent Bengali and I said I'm a problem king Airlines downsize which means I have to downsize this a cut number of aircraft. I have to lay off employees. M right because I can't afford to operate under these depressed economic circumstances. He said no at this time connectivity is important. Yeah. The jobs and employment are important particularly because you
1:18:52 know typically in an airline they're not blue collar workers. Huh? M these are not like work men. Yeah. And the the boys and girls who work in an airline can't be classified as blue collar. And he said I don't want them to lose their jobs. So you continue banks will support you. That is how it all started. I was told not to downsize King Fisher at that time and yes the banks did support. All right. Now what happened then? Lot of well you tell me the narrative. I'll tell you the
1:19:38 truth. You tell me the narrative. Then there was a consortium formed of 17 banks and the loan was given to you via SBI right? Was that the first or IDBI was first? See this is where people are not aware. I acquired Eden which everybody says was a big mistake. Yeah. What? In $137 million or something like that. Everybody says you overpaid for it. In the world of business, there's something known as
1:20:25 consolidation, industry consolidation. There is something known as eliminate the disruptor. Okay. Eden was famous for advertising and promoting one rupee tickets. Yeah. Clearly you could never ever sustain any airline business selling tickets for one rupee. Right. Okay. It was a bait. H but that set certain price expectations in the mindset of the customers. Yeah. and affected not only Decker which was losing money but the industry as a whole
1:21:11 of which King Fisher was also a part. Right? So at that time we looked at it was also Bangalore based. It had the same Airbus aircraft. It had the same train pilots as King Fisher. So there was a lot of engineering compatibility plus scale and size with a merger of Kingfisher and Deka eliminate the disruptor and consolidate the industry and Kingfisher Airlines. That was the logic of buying
1:21:57 Dean, not this much touted logic of I was desperate to fly overseas. I needed to get past that 5-year hurdle. Complete nonsense. Now, why should I shout from the rooftops trying to trying to clarify this? But if you talk to anybody about elimination of a disruptor and consolidation of industry, it'll start make and commonality of equipment, it'll start making business sense. But if your philosophy was to make a premium airline, why would you buy something which stands for lowc cost carrier, which stands for something cheap, which stands for one rupee ticket? Because the
1:22:43 customers would be completely different. The only obvious sense which anybody could make it out from it was if you are going for a different vision you are probably going out because the 5year window which you wanted uh which you wanted to bounce right probably yeah of course like that was the logic like I to clarify to tell people who don't know about it the logic that people talk about is if an Indian airline wanted to fly overseas they should have operated in India for at least 5 years before getting the license to operate air and you didn't have that and that's why you bought air deck in so that you could start flying overseas and you paid an absurd amount of price for it that's what people say so who is the people
1:23:29 that you're quoting everybody like all the things that I've read all the all the media like media right yeah like the legacy media right the legacy media the people who are responsible for giving us the information I mean that's what as a citizen that's where I get my information from correct and at least from the ones who I really respect. So I don't think anybody at UB group was that dumb with a lack of business understanding to buy an airline, an operating airline just to be able to fly overseas. I'm telling you the logic was consolidation of the industry given the commonality of
1:24:14 equipment. I referred a little earlier to the installation of a front cabin or business class which we called king first which Indigo are doing even now. There are certain routes in India that demand right a front cabin where there are people who will only fly business class fair but the bulk of India people want a single class product Dean fitted that bill fantastically right we opened up more routes than had ever been opened before or available for air connectivity
1:25:00 That was one of the biggest contributions we made to the Indian aviation sector and economy. Right. Dean also played a part in that. So, Kingfisher's sad failure subsequently had nothing to do with Dean. Okay. Nothing to do with how much we paid for Dean. Right. Got it. Those were totally separate set of reasons. Right. But business reasons. Here's a question on it. So I get the idea that you wanted to service more routes. You wanted to consolidate. That was a business decision. You saw that hey I want to build a premium airline but there's a bulk of India who cares about the price and you wanted to contribute
1:25:46 to make sure that I want to make sure that India gets to fly anywhere and everywhere through the price point which air deckin provides and if I could be the one to consolidate it and I could be the one to actually eliminate the disruptor I should do it. Business decision brilliant. Do you think then the wrong decision was to rebrand it to King Fisher Red? Because you can't start operating one Deckan and one King Fisher. So we just called it King Fisher Red. I mean rebranding is is is common in the world. Take Coca-Cola, right? There's Coke, there's Coke Zero, there's Diet Coke. It's all Coke, right? So a multibrand strategy is no rocket science. Yeah. But then the
1:26:33 philosophy of air decken was low cost and in kingfisher red. So kingfisher stood for premium. Kingfisher red stood for low cost. It was differentiated king fisher first and king fisher red. Okay. Right. You tell me something. What's the difference between coke zero and dad coke? Tell me. Just two names I don't know. Yeah fine. What's the philosophy behind it? You don't know. So how can all these commentators be commenting on king pusher first and king pusher red? You know the the trouble in India is that there are too many commentators who don't understand the facts and of course the media plays to the
1:27:18 gallery and that's how disinformation gets spread wide and then you stated somewhere again the commentators I'm quoting that I want to if I've put in a name king fisher on an airline no matter even if it's low cost I want to provide all the services you started providing all the services you started providing catering you started providing everything in a lowc cost carrier didn't you I began by saying that king fisher started off with all the attributes of a lowc cost carrier which is single class standard fleet etc etc etc but I said the only differentiator was inflight
1:28:05 entertainment and food [Music] I mean just because I gave food didn't make it a full service carrier. I mean you want shall I give you examples? Yeah. You go on any lowc cost carrier here in Europe. All right. Do they starve you or do they feed you? But you have to pay for it. No. All of them. I don't know. A few of them. The ones I
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