July 10: The dogfight in the skies is fast turning into a grubby affair.

After Air India said it would stop serving non-vegetarian meals in economy class - a cost-busting move that seems designed to curry favour with a vegetarian and yoga-inspired Narendra Modi regime, Tata-managed full-service airline Vistara riposted tonight with a cheeky tweet: "Chicken or vegetarian? We leave the choice to you."

The ad that Vistara tweeted places two dishes right next to each other: a plate of chicken biryani, topped with a green chilli and a tiny crock of salad, fighting for attention against a bowl of vegetarian pulao.

Airlines in India have been trying to chew up competition with price discounts and innovative offers but have rarely, if ever, been caught up in a gustatory game of cut and thrust.

At the heart of this battle is the element of choice - and the debate over whether airlines should have the right to knock their customers' teeth in with their dietary diktats for the so-called "cattle class".

Domestic flights in India have a reputation for serving horribly unappetising meals - and often compound the fliers' misery with plastic cutlery that tends to snap in two, making a hash of an already inedible meal.

Vistara's jibe also provides fodder for greater speculation. Last month, the Modi government cleared a proposal to sell its stake in the national airline, which is suffering colic pangs over its Rs 50,000-crore debt.

The Tatas - who brought civil aviation to India in 1932 when J.R.D. Tata flew a Puss Moth from Karachi to Bombay - have been considering a bid for Air India and will in all probability have to fight off a determined Indigo, the low-cost carrier that has emerged as the top dog with a domestic market share of over 41 per cent.

There is a delicious irony to all this: Vistara is promoted by the Tatas and Singapore Airlines, the consortium that had bid for Air India in 1999. However, the then Vajpayee government lacked the appetite for the divestment proposal, made by disinvestment minister Arun Jaitley.

Nearly two decades on, Jaitley as finance minister in the Modi government will get to oversee the stake sell-off since the department of disinvestment (now sounding a mouthful after being renamed as the department of investment and public asset management) has been folded into his ministry.

If the Tatas win the bidding war for Air India, it will be interesting to see the salad of options they toss for the menu in the economy class.

Till then, non-vegetarians flying economy on Air India will just have to lump it if they don't like it.