Jeh Wadia

Jeh portrait for stars page
Location:
India
Day job:
CEO of Indian Airline

JEH'S STORY

Jeh was born into one of India's richest and most powerful business families. He believes that "everyone has a higher purpose" and that his is to "end poverty in our country in my lifetime". But travelling to rural areas at weekends by private jet to do social work cost "more than taking a village out of poverty". So he started taking the train. On one of these 26-hour journeys he had his Eureka moment. He would launch a low-cost airline. With fares starting as low as one rupee, even "rickshaw drivers, servants, taxi drivers" could fly. Within a year he'd get a million people off the trains and into the skies.

 

JEH'S QUOTES

"How many people can afford a one rupee fare? I would imagine every single Indian can. Your rickshaw driver can, servants can."

"There are 15 million people who go by train in a day. You know, 15 million people... You do the math."

"The time for India is now. The time for developing businesses in India is now."

'If businesses grow a lot faster people have more disposable income. People have more disposable income then consumerism sets in and we’re on the verge where basically consumerism is setting in and it’s moving a lot like America."

"Aviation contributes less than 1.6% of total greenhouse gases…so why don’t people go and talk to the business or the industries that contribute more than 1.6% and come talk to us after they’ve spoken to the rest."

"If we can't even stand united on eradicating poverty in the world, what is basically the health of the planet going to have any chance?"

 

CRUDE DIARY ENTRIES
Star Wars alter egos
Whoever said using oil was all bad?

 

JEH'S VIDEO

This is a short intro to Jeh from an early rough cut of the film.
The real thing will no doubt be very different, but this is the general idea.

 

 

JEH'S PICTURES - click on image for larger version

 

   
 Filming Jeh at Mumbai airport  Jeh with mockup plane at Airbus in Toulouse
 
 Jeh inspects his new planes  Jeh about to criticise his staff