I am answering my own question. Took ORD-DEL in J. The plane is old and ratty, several seats did not work even after 'rebooting' by FAs, and could not even be moved manually.

On the other hand, the staff were younger and much more eager to please than on my previous trip (maybe 8 years ago). Maybe the aunties have been fired? Also the food was quite good, and courteously served in stages from carts like the AI of the 1970s. It's not Qatar by any means, and the schedule (one meal after boarding, one meal midflight, then nothing more) is peculiar although admittedly CX was also doing it at some point. Still, he offered to hold the second meal until close to the end of the flight, so it was sort of unofficial dine on demand. Not bad for AI.

If they could acquire some modern seats, they might be quite competitive. Right now because of high demand prices are high even on AI, but in the longer term they will still have to cut prices to sell J tickets if they don't invest in the hard product.