Air Deccan chief Gopinath joins LS poll fray

27 March 2009

Close on the heels of ABN Amro's head of Indian operations Meera Sanyal announcing her candidature for the Lok Sabha elections as a South Mumbai independent (See: ABN Amro India chief to contest LS poll), another corporate head, iconic Air Deccan founder G R Gopinath, has decided to do the same from Bangalore.

Unlike Sanyal, however, this is not the first political foray for Captain Gopinath, as he is popularly known. He had contested the Karnataka assembly elections in 1994 as a BJP candidate, but failed to win the Gandasi seat in his home district of Hassan.

At a press conference that he called this morning soon after he took his decision, captain Gopinath said he is yet to decide on which of the four Bangalore Lok Sabha constituencies he will contest from.

Elaborating his plank, Gopinath said, ''None of the political parties represent the aspirations of a new, young and emerging India, which is frustrated with what they have.'' His goals would be to represent the best interests of the constituency he represents, and to create jobs and seek to end inequality, he added.

''My plunge into politics was born out of my own frustration, agony and pain at the kind of political set-up we have in our country. Our political parties are either with a particular community or are fighting against a community; they are either with business houses or against business houses. There is no inner party democracy in any party,'' he said.

Like Sanyal, he also expressed disillusionment with political parties' response to the Mumbai terror attacks. ''It was not spontaneous. There was no fire in their speech,'' he said of the political response to the terror attacks. ''I never found any feeling. It was largely a political consideration. The response was weak.''

Gopinath said he was staying in one of Mumbai's hotels when terrorists put the city under siege.