DGCA allows IndiGo CEO Elbers, COO Porqueras one-time 24-hour extension to respond to show-cause notices on flight disruptions

“The DGCA has cautioned that failure to submit a complete and comprehensive reply within the extended timeline will result in the regulator proceeding ex-parte, based on the available records,” a senior official said.

According to sources in the know, the notices said that the large-scale operational failures at IndiGo indicate significant lapses in planning, oversight, and resource management, and prima facie reflect non-compliance by the airline on some provisions of the Aircraft Rules, 1937 and the new Flight Duty Time Limitation (FDTL) rules. The notices also stated that IndiGo failed to provide the affected passengers proper information and facilities that are mandatory in the case of flight delays and cancellations.

“Whereas, as the CEO, you are responsible for ensuring effective management of the airlines but you have failed in your duty to ensure timely arrangements for conduct of reliable operations and the availability of requisite facilities to the passengers,” the DGCA’s notice to Elbers is learnt to have said.

Sources indicated that stringent action could be in the offing for India’s largest airline and its top executives in view of the disruption due to which scores of flights have been cancelled on a daily basis this week, leaving thousands of passengers stranded at airports across India. The action is expected to be taken on the basis of the report of the four-member inquiry committee that was set up by the DGCA on Friday. The panel has two weeks to submit its report.

The massive disruption at IndiGo—India’s largest airline that commands over 60 per cent of the domestic market share—has thrown commercial flight operations out of gear all over the country for the better part of this week. The DGCA on Friday granted IndiGo a temporary one-time exemption from some night operations-related changes in the new Flight Duty Time Limitation (FDTL) norms for its Airbus A320 pilots. The temporary rollback, which will be in place till February 10, is likely to help IndiGo—caught grossly unprepared for the new crew rest norms—to get its act together and stabilise operations from heron. The DGCA has also granted a few other temporary relaxations to IndiGo.

Meanwhile, the crisis-stricken airline is limping back to normalcy with the carrier expected to operate over 1,650 or its 2,300-plus scheduled flights on Sunday, with an overall on-time performance (OTP) of around 75 per cent, according to data shared by IndiGo. The airline also said that it now has “growing confidence” that it will achieve the stabilisation of its network by December 10, against the earlier communicated timeline of December 10-15. While the operation of 1,650 flights means that the airline cancelled over 650 flights on Sunday, the number of cancellations is lower than the previous three days.

On Saturday, IndiGo had operated around 1,500 flights, more than double of Friday’s around 700 flights, when cancellations were “well over 1,000”. Friday was the worst day in IndiGo’s network-wide disruption this week, as the airline had decided to “reboot the network, systems, and rosters” to mitigate the widespread delays and flight cancellations. Its OTP was 20.7 per cent on Saturday, up from Friday’s all-time low of 3.7 per cent on Friday, as per data from the Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA). According to the ministry, by Sunday evening, IndiGo had processed refunds worth Rs 610 crore to passengers hit by the disruption.

In a message to IndiGo staff on Sunday, Elbers said that the carrier—which commands over 60 per cent of domestic air passenger volumes—is getting back on track “step by step”.

The primary reason for this disruption is crew shortages in the wake of the new FDTL rules, which IndiGo did not plan for properly. As per the DGCA, IndiGo informed it that the disruptions “have arisen primarily from misjudgement and planning gaps in implementing” the second phase of new FDTL rules, with the airline accepting that the actual crew requirement for the new rules exceeded what it had anticipated.

Although the new FDTL rules apply to all domestic airlines, IndiGo has been the most severely-affected carrier. The factors that have made IndiGo more vulnerable, according to industry sources, include its massive scale of operations, a high-frequency network, significant number of night and wee hour flights, and high aircraft and crew utilisation levels, leaving little elbow room for the airline to manage crew shortages. With its fleet of over 400 aircraft, IndiGo operates over 2,300 flights a day. By contrast, the next biggest airline group—Air India—operates less than half the number of flights IndiGo operates.