Passengers at an IndiGo airline's counter at the airport.
Credit: PTI Photo
IndiGo which is the country's largest airline, which generally operates around 2,300 flights daily, cancelled over 1,000 flights on Friday, December 5.
The chaos at the airports, caused by large-scale flight delays and cancellations by IndiGo, is the result of poor management of crew deployment norms and flight schedules, and the entire responsibility for the disruptions should go to the airline.
As the airline is struggling to manage operational disruptions, a question has been part of every conversation - how is IndiGo still selling tickets?
The simple reason behind it is that IndiGo has not suspended its entire schedule. It operates more than 2,200 flights a day across domestic and international sectors, and only certain flights on this vast network have been cancelled
IndiGo's other routes continue to operate normally. Since IndiGo's full network is not grounded, it continues to sell seats on flights. It cancelled all flights from Bengaluru to Delhi and Mumbai until midnight.
With IndiGo flight cancellations continuing on the fifth day, the Kempegowda International Airport (KIA) remained in turmoil as stranded passengers searched for alternatives.
Airfares across the country skyrocketed on Friday, following the cancellation of almost 1,000 flights on major domestic routes by India’s largest airline, IndiGo - leaving thousands of passengers stranded and scrambling for alternatives at many airports.
Many passengers were forced to pay steep last-minute prices to travel on competing airlines.
With demand shifting abruptly to other carriers, fares soared. On Friday, tickets were seen priced as high as Rs 1.2 lakh in some sectors. A Delhi-Chennai fare, typically around Rs 10,000, was available in the Rs 40,000-90,000 band.
Delhi-Bengaluru tickets were seen between Rs 93,000 and Rs 1,00,000, while even the lowest fares on budget carriers hovered around Rs 35,000. A Delhi-Mumbai ticket was selling at Rs 50,000-60,000.
IndiGo cancelled a total of 292 flights at Terminal 1 of Bengaluru’s Kempegowda International Airport as of 7 pm, Friday, including 125 arrivals and 167 departures. Only 38 IndiGo flights took off from the airport on Friday evening.
IndiGo cancelled all flights from Bengaluru to Delhi and Mumbai until midnight.
Many passengers raised complaints about the last-minute cancellations after receiving no prior intimation from the airline.
A day after aviation watchdog DGCA relaxed the flight duty and rest period norms, IndiGo flight services continue to be disrupted on the fifth consecutive day, with over 200 flights from Delhi and Mumbai being cancelled on Saturday.
About 109 IndiGo flights were cancelled at Mumbai airport, 51 arrivals and 58 departures, and 106 flights at Delhi airport, which included 54 departures and 52 arrivals.
It may be mentioned here that on Friday, DGCA provided temporary relief to IndiGo, which is partially owned by Rahul Bhatia, by way of rolling back the night duty definition to 12 am-5 am from 12 am-6 am earlier, and allowing its pilots to do six night-landings from two earlier, besides other relaxations.
(With PTI and DHNS inputs)