The operational meltdown at IndiGo stretched into its fourth harrowing day on Friday, December 5, as the airline cancelled over 550 flights nationwide.
The crisis reached a new peak in the capital, where departures from Delhi were placed on an unprecedented hold until 3 p.m., leaving terminals choked with thousands of stranded passengers. What began earlier in the week as a ripple of delays attributed to winter fog has now escalated into a full-blown systemic failure, triggered by the airline’s inability to manage new crew rostering regulations.
Scenes of pandemonium were reported from major hubs including Mumbai, Bengaluru, and Delhi. Passengers described airports resembling refugee camps, with travelers sleeping on the floor, luggage piles growing unattended, and food counters running dry. The breakdown in communication was absolute for many, as digital display boards showed flight times that had long since passed.
The root of the chaos lies in the implementation of the Directorate General of Civil Aviation’s new Flight Duty Time Limitations. These norms, designed to mitigate pilot fatigue by ensuring 48 hours of weekly rest and limiting night landings, caught the country’s largest carrier unprepared. Despite having months to prepare, IndiGo’s management admitted to the regulator that they had misjudged the crew requirements, leading to a severe shortage of pilots just as the winter travel season kicked into high gear.
The human cost of this corporate miscalculation played out in real-time on social media. CA Yash Khandelwal shared his frustration on X, painting a picture of the disarray at Mumbai airport. He noted that IndiGo was a complete mess, describing how his flight was delayed for an hour before boarding, only for passengers to wait another hour inside the aircraft. He highlighted the plight of others who had been waiting for more than eight hours, including a groom who was stranded and was supposed to get married that very day.
While the groom risked missing his wedding, others faced simpler but equally exhausting ordeals. Prakash Dadlani offered a poignant account of the sheer exhaustion that gripped families. He recounted getting stuck in the mess the previous night, where an 8 p.m. flight eventually took off at 6 a.m. after ten long hours. He described kids crying and old people waiting without any updates from the airline. Dadlani expressed sympathy for the ground staff, who tried their best but faced the brunt of passenger anger, noting that they did not deserve the hate. He emphasized that IndiGo knew about the delays but kept everyone waiting instead of helping, concluding that while they reached home safely, such a breakdown should not have happened.
The crisis has sparked a broader debate about the fragility of the Indian aviation sector, which is increasingly dominated by a duopoly. As the airline apologized and sought exemptions from the new safety rules until February 2026, industry watchers questioned the cost of efficiency.
Ramesh Srivats offered a sharp perspective on the safety implications of the previous status quo. He remarked that the more cancelled flights he saw due to the new crew rest norms, the more he wondered how unsafe it must have been to fly with a tired crew before these regulations were enforced.
Amidst the anger, there was dark humor regarding the logistical waste. Comedian Atul Khatri quipped about the scale of the cancellations, stating that with 330 flights cancelled in two days, he was primarily worried about the number of sandwiches gone to waste.
However, the underlying sentiment remained one of helplessness against a market leader that controls nearly two-thirds of domestic traffic. Manoj Arora articulated this frustration perfectly, criticizing the lack of accountability in a monopolistic market. He pointed out that nobody cares about the customer when the industry becomes a virtual monopoly or duopoly.
Drawing parallels with telecom and e-commerce, he argued that less competition inevitably leads to more customer pain. Arora concluded that IndiGo’s hit was a reminder that when power concentrates, fairness evaporates, and the final bill always lands on the customer’s lap.
Fasten your seat belts. It looks like this pain isn’t going away any time soon, much like IndiGo’s stranded passengers.
