A Noble Dream Gone Sour

Yesterday (21st March, 2026), TheBhutanese newspaper featured a news report that caused me deep anguish - forcing me to renege on my resolve sometime back - not to ever think or write about DrukAir. According to the article, the DrukAir had apparently attempted to hoodwink Gyem Gyeltshen – the husband and father of the mother-daughter duo tragically killed in the airline’s helicopter crash over three years back – the probable cause of which was determined to be, in the words of the newspaper, “human error of the pilot caused by management and relation issues.”

I will keep my share ....... and yours as well!

Gyem Gyeltshen turns out to be a person of extremely humble background – an illiterate Bjop from the remote highlands of Lunana, far removed from the hubbub of urban Thimphu – the playground of the rich, the powerful and the well-connected. An apparent non-entity, it would appear that DrukAir had decided that Gyem Gyeltshen could be trampled with at will, and any which way they liked!

No doubt, the DrukAir management was unmindful that as poor and hapless as he might be - Gyem Gyeltshen, by virtue of being a Bhutanese, is a legitimate and undeniable part-owner of the airline. Thus, at a certain level what the DrukAir did is an act of treachery and disloyalty. Even if that were not the case, at the least, the poor aggrieved fellow is deserving of the most basic human decency – some kind and comforting words …. and restitution that is commensurate with the extreme tragedy that has been inflicted him. Such a noble act on the part of the DrukAir management would have been deemed appropriate and in fulfillment of its corporate social responsibility - an unwritten requirement expected of every responsible organization doing business in the country.

For sure no amount of wailing will bring back Gyem Gyeltshen’s wife and daughter – they are forever lost to eternity. But the least the institution that is responsible for his pain and grief can do is treat him with dignity --- instead of attempting to rub salt to injury.

Is it too much to ask that Gyem Gyeltshen be treated fairly and in a just manner? Is he not worthy of receiving what is determined to be his just due? But it is clear that DrukAir won’t do it. Will our justice system step forward and do it for him? Isn’t there any other institutions in this country that can rein in this monstrosity?

For years, the DrukAir has been allowed to cause pain and failure to many hundreds of emerging businesses – hundreds upon thousands have been deprived of their livelihood because the airline company stood in the path of people’s progress and success. Their mindlessness has caused, and continues to cause, grave injury to the country’s lucrative tourism industry – the airline plays a major part in the ongoing failure that the country’s tourism industry is experiencing. And yet, they are allowed to continue to bleed the country – it is as if they were crated for that very purpose.

But I am a living witness from day one of the airline’s creation in the early 1980s. Thus, I am fully cognizant of the noble, and singular, intention behind its creation.

The airline was not created so that it can gag the Bhutanese peoples’ spirit of enterprise - it was created to let soar the Bhutanese dream!