I recently flew on the new Air India non-stop between JFK and Mumbai(AI 140/141)and had a pretty good experience. Going home this time, I was specifically looking for a non-stop flight and selected Air India because of the three airlines currently doing non-stop duty between New York and Mumbai, Air India is the only one offering flat bed seats in business class(Delta and Continental still have the old-style cradle seat which is ridiculous and uncomfortable to boot). I was happy with my choice! The aircraft is a pretty new Boeing 777-LR and it’s very stylishly decorated with red carpeting and red and beige seats. The business class seat is very comfy, although it’s a bit narrower than Delta’s business class seat. If you are a normal-sized person, you will be fine, however, you still have to turn over carefully! Most important, it really does go fully flat which makes for a good night’s sleep, essential on such a long flight. The crew hands out nice thick duvets, blankets and pillows which also helps.
There’s a privacy screen you can raise(most of us didn’t bother) and a large 15.4 inch personal LCD screen(much bigger than Delta’s 10-inch screens). Excellent IFE system with a large selection of Hindi and English films(both recent and classics) plus the usual English and Hindi TV, news and music channels. They handed out Bose headsets which was a nice touch! Another nice touch - they handed out Pierre Cardin designed sleep suits which we all changed into before take-off(allocated by size and gender) so the cabin looked very funny with a bunch of people in color coordinated sleep suits!:-) The best part was the food - they served three meals each way and the choices for both Western and Indian(veg and non-veg) were terrific. One of the choices was lobster thermidor! Regretfully, since I avoid seafood on flights, I settled for the excellent chicken biryani instead! The staff was excellent, very attentive, and the senior purser actually came around to introduce himself to each passenger and asked us to let him know if we had any special requests!
Punctuality-wise, we were about half an hour late leaving JFK and on the return leg were delayed by about 45 minutes leaving Mumbai. However, this was largely due to a lot of congestion at both airports and with time made up in the air, we reached only about 15 minutes late each way which is not bad. Baggage handling was excellent with bags on the carousel as soon as you cleared immigration, and check-in both ways was pretty smooth. The lounges in both New York and Mumbai are pretty tired looking and definitely need to be updated. One nice extra is that Air India offers a complimentary limo service in both New York and Mumbai for all business and first class passengers. I didn’t use the service in Mumbai as family comes to pick me up, but the New York limo service was terrific, new cars and good drivers, and it saved me about$120 in round trip car service fees.
Overall, a very good experience, which could have been great, if the seats had been a bit wider and the lounges more up to date. I can definitely recommend this flight if you are looking for a good non-stop option to India.