On a quiet Thursday afternoon, when political Twitter was busy parsing poll data and LinkedIn was still celebrating RCB’s long-awaited IPL victory, a four-hour podcast featuring Vijay Mallya quietly dropped on Raj Shamani’s YouTube channel. No press conference. No legal update. Just a billionaire-turned-exile, calmly seated across from business influencer Raj Shamani, offering what can only be described as a controlled demolition of the narrative that’s defined him for over a decade.
“I’m not a thief,” he insists. “Where is the chor? Where is the chori?”
The moment didn’t feel like a casual chat. It felt staged – strategically, thoughtfully, perhaps even brilliantly. Because for the first time in years, Mallya wasn’t being spoken about. He was doing the speaking. And the platform wasn’t a courtroom, a press release, or an old-school interview. It was a podcast: long-form, algorithm-boosted, emotionally forgiving.
In the days that followed, the video garnered millions of views, thousands of comments, and—most curiously—support from corners of the internet once unrelentingly hostile to him. Suddenly, what looked like an isolated interview started to resemble something else: a pattern. A campaign. A soft re-entry into public life under the comforting umbrella of content.
So, what’s really going on here?
Is this the dawn of a redemption arc or just a savvy PR move dressed as vulnerability? And in a world where narratives can be bought, borrowed, and rebranded, should we be preparing for the next chapter of Vijay Mallya: the Movie?
Vijay Mallya – The King of Good Times, Then and Now
For much of the early 2000s, Vijay Mallya was more than just a businessman, he was a lifestyle brand. Dubbed “The King of Good Times,” he was the face of United Breweries, the force behind India’s most recognized beer brand (Kingfisher), and a man whose yacht parties, Formula 1 team, and IPL franchise, Royal Challengers Bangalore, earned him celebrity status far beyond corporate boardrooms.
Born in 1955, Mallya inherited United Breweries from his father, Vittal Mallya, and expanded it aggressively into aviation, real estate, and global liquor brands. He acquired Whyte & Mackay in Scotland and even picked up French winemakers. At his peak, Mallya was not just a poster boy for Indian capitalism—he was its most flamboyant ambassador.
But that image began to fray with the launch and subsequent collapse of Kingfisher Airlines.
Founded in 2005, Kingfisher aimed to revolutionize air travel in India. Mallya promised luxury in the skies: gourmet meals, red uniforms, and a premium brand aesthetic in a market still focused on affordability. But the business model faltered. High fuel costs, poor route decisions, and mounting debt began to plague the airline. It acquired Air Deccan in 2007, a move many analysts later described as a “strategic disaster.” By 2012, Kingfisher Airlines had grounded operations entirely.
The airline’s failure left behind a financial black hole of over ₹9,000 crore ($1.2 billion) in unpaid loans to a consortium of Indian banks. In March 2016, Mallya left India for the UK, just days before a court issued a non-bailable warrant. Indian authorities accused him of financial mismanagement, willful default, and money laundering. He was declared a “fugitive economic offender” under India’s newly minted law, and the country initiated extradition proceedings through UK courts.
Since then, Mallya has remained in the UK, battling extradition and reiterating that he did not “run away,” but left for “business reasons” with full disclosure. His legal team has consistently maintained that the loans were mischaracterized, that he offered to repay the banks, and that he is being scapegoated for systemic failures in Indian banking.
Meanwhile, in the public eye, Mallya’s persona has undergone a transformation – less James Bond villain, more ghost of capitalism past. From trending Twitter jokes to court hearings being live-blogged, his story became a cultural fixture.
And yet, 2025 delivered an unexpected twist. When RCB lifted their first IPL trophy after 17 long seasons, old footage of Mallya celebrating in the stands resurfaced. Fans began debating whether the team’s victory felt incomplete without the man who had once been its face. Nostalgia returned and, quietly, so did Vijay Mallya.
Now, in 2025, he’s no longer being tracked by paparazzi outside Westminster court. He’s being tagged in reels, debated in comment sections, and invited to podcasts.
The king may have lost his airline, but he may have found something else – an audience that’s ready, or at least curious, to hear his version of the story.
The Vijay Mallya Podcast Play: Breaking the Silence in Long Form?
For nearly a decade, Vijay Mallya maintained a careful public silence. His interactions were limited to brief legal statements, occasional tweets during festivals, and a few flashbulb appearances outside UK courts. In India, the narrative had largely calcified – he was a fugitive billionaire, a cautionary tale about over-leveraged ambition. His name was synonymous with excess, failure, and financial scandal.
That changed dramatically in June 2025, when Mallya sat down for a nearly four-hour conversation on “Figuring Out,” a podcast hosted by entrepreneur and content creator Raj Shamani. With over three million subscribers, Shamani’s platform is one of India’s most influential spaces for entrepreneurial storytelling and personal brand revival. For Mallya, it was an ideal stage.
But this wasn’t a hard-hitting interrogation. It was a long, meandering, yet emotionally orchestrated discussion – covering everything from Kingfisher’s rise and fall, to his flamboyant persona, to his relationship with the Indian government, and most notably, to his repeated assertion that he has been misunderstood and misrepresented.
“I never intended to defraud anyone,” Mallya claimed.
“I offered to settle the loans, even before I left.”
The tone was calculated but human. He expressed regret – particularly for the employees of Kingfisher Airlines, many of whom were left unpaid during the airline’s collapse – but refrained from accepting legal liability. He emphasized systemic banking failures, alleged media exaggeration, and the political undertones that shaped his downfall.
There was no shouting match. No hostile questions. Just a man in a jacket, with a mic, retelling his version of history with the casual confidence of someone who’d had years to rehearse it.
And it worked. The comments section flooded with surprising support. Some users praised him for “finally speaking up.” Others criticized the podcast for being too soft, too apologetic. But few could deny the strategic brilliance: in a post-viral world, podcasting has become the new courtroom of public opinion.
The format plays to Vijay Mallya’s strengths. In a traditional TV interview, time is limited, edits are many, and questions are sharper. In a podcast, especially one hosted by someone already respectful of your legacy, you can reshape the narrative at your own pace. You can pause. You can laugh. You can emote. You can sound less like a defendant and more like a misunderstood visionary who got tangled in the machinery of the system.
And for a man whose biggest battle is not just legal, but reputational—this matters. The four-hour interview didn’t change the facts of his case, but it reframed the tone of conversation. It recast Mallya not as an absconder hiding behind privilege, but as a businessman caught between ambition and institutional failure.
Podcasts have, in recent years, served as launchpads for comeback narratives across the world. From Jordan Belfort to Elizabeth Holmes’ former colleagues, long-form digital media offers redemption—or at least, rehabilitation. It’s less about facts, more about vibes. Less about the past, more about how you tell it.
In choosing Figuring Out, Vijay Mallya signaled that he’s not returning through the courtroom. He’s coming back through the algorithm.
Audience Reaction & Digital Sentiment on Raj Shamani’s Podcast with Vijay Mallya
For a figure once demonized in headlines and mocked in memes, Vijay Mallya’s podcast appearance struck a surprisingly different chord. In a digital landscape often defined by outrage and cancellation, the reaction was neither uniform nor entirely negative. Instead, it was complicated – an unpredictable mix of curiosity, nostalgia, cynicism, and in some cases, empathy.
Within hours of the podcast’s release, the video climbed YouTube’s trending charts in India. By day two, it had crossed a million views. But more telling than the metrics was the tone of the comments section—a raw, unfiltered digital focus group.
“He doesn’t sound like a criminal. He sounds like someone who just took a big bet and lost.”
“He’s still more dignified than many current politicians.”
“Where were these insights ten years ago?”
These weren’t isolated remarks. Across X (formerly Twitter), Instagram, Reddit threads, and WhatsApp forwards, the tone was consistent: people weren’t necessarily exonerating Mallya, but they were—at the very least—reconsidering him. Many younger viewers, especially those without lived memory of the Kingfisher collapse, encountered him without the historical baggage, evaluating his words more on narrative than fact.
This demographic shift matters. Mallya is not trying to change the minds of bankers or courts. He’s appealing to the next generation—the one that consumes history through reels and retellings, not newspapers and court documents.
And digital sentiment analysis reflects this shift. According to preliminary sentiment mapping on social platforms (as tracked by marketing analysts and YouTube tools), roughly 52–55% of responses categorized as “neutral to positive,” with another 30% critical, and the rest undecided or confused. That’s a dramatic improvement from the near-universal disdain of the mid-2010s.
Meanwhile, content creators joined the chorus. Reaction videos, explainer reels, and financial opinion channels dissected Mallya’s quotes, facial expressions, and his overall “media strategy.” Some influencers praised him as a “case study in brand resurrection.” Others questioned Raj Shamani for going too soft—one popular tweet read:
“You don’t invite a fugitive on your show just to ask him about his love for cricket.”
But in a media economy where clicks often matter more than conclusions, even criticism serves a purpose. The podcast episode has gone viral not because it revealed anything dramatically new—but because it reactivated a dormant narrative. And more importantly, it gave Mallya a new role: no longer an icon of excess, but a case study in comeback content.
Interestingly, a wave of RCB fans—fresh off the emotional high of their team’s first-ever IPL title—also found themselves conflicted. For years, Mallya had been the face of the franchise. His celebratory dances, red velvet suits, and unapologetic swagger were inseparable from the RCB brand. Now, as images of him resurfaced, many fans expressed a kind of retrospective warmth. “The man may have lost his airline,” one Reddit user wrote, “but he built a team we now believe in.”
The podcast has not reversed Mallya’s public image—but it has undeniably complicated it.
And in the age of digital storytelling, complexity is often more powerful than clarity.
Who Is Sabeer Bhatia—and Why Does He Want a Podcast with Vijay Mallya Now?
Just as the buzz around the Vijay Mallya-Raj Shamani podcast lit up the digital memory, another unexpected twist emerged. Sabeer Bhatia, the co-founder of Hotmail and one of the original poster boys of Indian tech success in Silicon Valley, posted a video on Instagram hinting that he, too, might sit down with Mallya for a podcast.
“Should I do a podcast with Vijay Mallya?” he asked his followers, smiling into the camera, sounding more amused than cautious. The poll underneath was a classic influencer move—but the man behind it was anything but.
Sabeer Bhatia, for the uninitiated, is often remembered as India’s first tech unicorn story. In 1996, he co-founded Hotmail, the world’s first web-based email service. In 1997, Microsoft bought it for an estimated $400 million—a staggering figure at the time. He was just 29. For a generation of aspiring Indian engineers and entrepreneurs, Bhatia became the benchmark for “making it” in Silicon Valley.
But post-Hotmail, his journey has been quieter. He launched a few ventures—Arzoo.com, JaxtrSMS, and most recently, ShowReel (a video-resume and startup pitching platform). While none reached Hotmail-level success, Bhatia has retained his reputation as a visionary, albeit one more media-shy than others in the tech spotlight.
Which is why his sudden alignment with Vijay Mallya feels…odd. Or deliberate.
The question isn’t just “Why does Bhatia want to talk to Mallya?” It’s also: What does he stand to gain?
At first glance, the podcast proposal may seem like simple curiosity—a Silicon Valley veteran intrigued by another high-profile Indian figure with a controversial legacy. But scratch the surface, and it’s evident this may be more than just a one-off content idea.
1. Billionaire-to-Billionaire Validation
In a landscape where influence often trumps integrity, a podcast like this functions as a form of reputational endorsement. Bhatia, with his tech-world credibility, brings a different kind of legitimacy to Mallya – one that appeals to startups, NRIs, and digitally-savvy youth. It shifts the narrative from fugitive finance to entrepreneurial resilience.
2. Content as Capital
Bhatia himself has become increasingly active in the content space with ShowReel. Hosting Vijay Mallya isn’t just about storytelling—it’s audience engineering. It’s tapping into controversy to power virality. A well-timed interview could put his platform on the map in a way even product innovation can’t.
3. The New Podcast Economy
We’re seeing the rise of the “reputation exchange podcast”—a format where hosts lend credibility and guests provide views. Think Lex Fridman with controversial tech figures. Or Joe Rogan with discredited scientists. In this model, controversy isn’t avoided—it’s monetized.
And perhaps most importantly…
4. The Larger Trend: India’s Billionaire Rebrand Season
Vijay Mallya may just be the first domino. With public attention shifting from scandals to storytelling, figures like Lalit Modi, Subrata Roy, and even Nirav Modi’s extended circle could find similar soft landing zones in India’s booming podcast universe. Bhatia might be positioning himself as the go-to host for complicated legacies.
Of course, there’s still uncertainty around whether the podcast will actually happen. But even teasing it was enough to spark discourse—and that may have been the real point.
In a world where perception shapes power, and where long-form media feels more intimate than courtroom proceedings, the Sabeer-Mallya pairing feels less like tech meets tabloid and more like credibility meets content strategy.
Podcasting as Reputation Management: A Global Playbook
Vijay Mallya’s podcast debut didn’t just stir the Indian internet—it positioned him as the latest entry in a growing list of powerful, controversial figures who are bypassing traditional media and opting for long-form, algorithm-friendly platforms to rewrite their public narratives.
This isn’t random. It’s playbook material now.
The Podcast Era of “Image Rehab”
Over the past five years, we’ve seen a major shift in how the disgraced or disputed tell their side of the story. It no longer happens in a 5-minute primetime interview or a press statement crafted by a PR team. It happens in a 90-minute YouTube video or Spotify episode, sandwiched between ad reads and slow-burn conversations about “mental health” and “being misunderstood.”
From Jordan Belfort (The Wolf of Wall Street) to Monica Lewinsky, from Logan Paul after the Japan forest scandal to Lance Armstrong post-doping, the podcast format has offered something traditional media cannot: control over tone, pace, and framing. No aggressive edits. No ticking clocks. Just humanizing vulnerability wrapped in a studio mic.
Mallya’s move fits seamlessly into this ecosystem.
He may not have called it “reputation management,” but that’s exactly what it is – an SEO-friendly, viral-ready, long-form rebuttal to years of hostile headlines. It allows him to sidestep the combative posture of media interviews and instead lean into “storytelling,” a more palatable word for narrative control.
Why Podcasts Work Better Than Press Conferences
- No Hostile Interruption – Unlike hard-hitting TV interviews, most podcasts (especially influencer-led ones) lean toward empathy. Hosts rarely interrupt, challenge, or cross-examine. They’re collaborators, not critics.
- Time Heals—and Podcasts Exploit That – People forget details. They remember tone. A podcast delivered years after a scandal can reframe the same facts under a new light—softer, older, more “learned from.”
- Emotional Real Estate – Podcasts give guests emotional space. There’s room to sigh. To pause. To say “I regret that,” even if legal documents say otherwise.
- Narrative Virality – Unlike legal outcomes, podcasts don’t need proof—they need engagement. And outrage or surprise, especially from high-profile names, fuels algorithms across YouTube, Instagram, and X.
- New Audience, Clean Slate – Mallya isn’t trying to convince the bankers. He’s reaching Gen Z entrepreneurs, Instagram reels scrollers, and crypto-optimists who don’t remember the Kingfisher airline strike, but love a good comeback story.
The Unsaid Strategy
Let’s call it what it really is: Reputation arbitrage. Vijay Mallya is trading his villainous legacy for narrative capital in a medium where the cost of reentry is a microphone and a willing host.
It doesn’t mean he’s innocent. It doesn’t mean people forget. But it does mean he now has a say in how his story is being retold.
And that, for someone labeled a fugitive billionaire for nearly a decade, is a massive shift.
Great—let’s now dive into Section 7 – “What Comes Next: Biopics, Books, or Business?”, continuing our NYT/Forbes-style deep-dive with smart, speculative insight and grounded context.
What Comes Next for Vijay Mallya: Biopics, Books, or Business?
If history (and Netflix) has taught us anything, it’s that controversial lives make for compelling content. The public has an insatiable appetite for redemption arcs, downfall dramas, and complex antiheroes – especially when they come from the boardroom rather than Bollywood. And Vijay Mallya, whether he likes it or not, checks all three boxes.
So the obvious question is: Where does this podcast moment lead?
1. The Biopic Temptation
It’s almost surprising that a “King of Good Times” movie doesn’t already exist. Vijay Mallya’s story has all the cinematic ingredients: flamboyance, empire, excess, downfall, exile, courtrooms, yachts, IPL teams, Formula One, fashion calendars, and private jets. It’s The Big Short meets Catch Me If You Can, with a dash of The Great Gatsby.
And if Scam 1992 taught Indian streaming platforms anything, it’s that viewers love complex financial stories. There were whispers in 2018 of a documentary being pitched around Mallya’s life, but nothing materialized. Post-podcast, the interest may return – this time with more nuance, and perhaps even his unofficial blessing.
After all, reclaiming the narrative works best when you write the script.
2. A Book, Maybe Ghostwritten. Maybe Not.
If the podcast was step one in humanizing his story, a memoir could be the next logical leap. Mallya has always fancied himself as a larger-than-life character—heir to a business empire, self-styled tycoon, and a rare Indian who mixed boardroom ambition with champagne charisma.
A well-crafted autobiography – especially one framed as “my side of the story” – would give him an unfiltered, quote-rich opportunity to present himself not as a criminal, but as a misunderstood capitalist who got caught in a swirl of media, politics, and systemic banking rot.
The timing couldn’t be better: Indian publishing is more open to controversial voices than ever before, and platforms like Amazon Kindle make self-publishing a low-risk, high-attention game.
3. A Return to Business? Risky but Not Impossible.
Legally, Vijay Mallya remains a “fugitive economic offender” under Indian law. There’s no sugarcoating that. But in exile, many such figures have quietly returned to business, albeit under different names, jurisdictions, or proxies. From shell ventures to offshore advisories, the pathways are there.
Could Vijay Mallya re-enter the startup ecosystem in some form? Possibly. Especially if he’s backed by sympathetic overseas investors, or content creators who see him less as a financial pariah and more as a charismatic mentor with cautionary wisdom.
Whether it’s crypto, D2C luxury, or media investments, businessmen rarely retire – they just pivot.
And that may be Mallya’s long-term play: not to come back to India, but to come back into relevance.
Final Thoughts: A Soft Landing or Strategic Resurrection for Vijay Mallya?
Vijay Mallya’s surprise entry into the podcast arena was never going to be just a conversation. In a world where storytelling is power, this was a rebrand attempt in real time—a reputation recalibration disguised as long-form dialogue. The podcast may not have absolved him, but it undeniably reshaped the optics. And in 2025, optics often matter more than outcomes.
What’s clear is this: Vijay Mallya is no longer interested in disappearing quietly.
After years of silence punctuated only by court appearances and legal updates, this sudden wave of visibility—through Raj Shamani’s podcast and now Sabeer Bhatia’s interest—feels less like a coincidence and more like a calculated campaign. Not to return to India, but to return to relevance. Not to fight the past, but to rewrite its public perception.
And it raises important questions—not just about Mallya, but about us:
- At what point does storytelling override scrutiny?
- Are we too quick to forget the facts when the narrative feels compelling?
- And are podcasts becoming the new courtrooms of public opinion—where guilt is relative, and charisma can sometimes outweigh consequences?
For Mallya, this is not yet a comeback. The courts still hold weight. The debts haven’t disappeared. The legal fight is ongoing.
But what we’re witnessing is a soft landing—a shift from being a national scandal to becoming a curiosity, a character, a conversation. Maybe even, one day, a case study.
It may not lead to redemption in legal terms. But in the only economy that counts in the age of digital media—attention—Vijay Mallya is no longer bankrupt.
And if this is indeed a strategic resurrection, it’s off to a very smart, very viral start.