Top News

More than 250 Indigo flights were canceled on Thursday.

IndiGo Flight Cancellations: Indigo airline, which is facing shortage of staff, has increased the problems of people traveling by air. Passengers are continuously creating ruckus at the airport. There are piles of suitcases at the airport. People spent the night on the airport grounds waiting for the flight. The videos going viral on social media are telling how the situation is. Media reports have claimed that more than 250 Indigo flights were canceled on Thursday alone. A total of more than 1000 flights have been canceled so far from different parts of the country.

Most of these flights were for cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Surat, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Jaipur, Bhopal and Indore. Due to cancellation of flights, passengers had to wait for hours and there was chaos at the airport.

In such a situation, the question is how big a company IndiGo is, which claims to be the seventh largest airline in terms of flight departures, how many employees it has, how many passengers traveled on IndiGo flights in the year 2024 and how this crisis arose.

Situation at Bengaluru's Kempegowda International Airport. Photo: PTI

How did the Indigo crisis arise? Let us first understand this.

How big the crisis that has arisen regarding Indigo's planes is, can be understood from the fact that Indigo has more than 60 percent share in the domestic aviation market. This is why the crisis is also big. Crowds are being seen at the airport. Videos of the altercation between staff and passengers are going viral on social media.

Now the question arises that how did the shortage of staff suddenly arise in this entire crisis that has arisen. How flights started getting canceled so quickly. A reply has come from Indigo regarding the entire matter. The company has blamed technical glitches, weather and new crew roster rules for this crisis. The company says that due to the new Flight Duty Time Limit (FDTL) rules from November 1, there has been a situation of shortage of pilots and crew. This is the reason why flights have been limited.

What was in the new roster?

FDTL rules say that 48 hours of rest every week is necessary for the pilot to recover from fatigue. Pilots can land a maximum of two times during night operations. Airlines should not roster flight crew members for more than 2 consecutive nights with duty periods during night operations. The situation worsened after this roster was implemented from November 1. The company cited lack of employees as the biggest reason for this.

There were arguments between employees and passengers at many airports in the country. Photo: PTI

How many employees does Indigo have?

Amidst the crisis arising after the new roster, the question arises that how many employees does IndiGo have? Figures from the official website of Indigo say that the company has a total of 39 thousand employees across the country. In this, up to 44 percent are women employees. About 2100 aircraft of Indigo fly daily. The company's aircraft fly to 122 places in the country and abroad.

How big a customer base, how many planes?

The company claims that it is the 7th largest airline in terms of daily departures. Talking about customer base, 10.7 crore passengers traveled by IndiGo in the year 2024. According to the official website of Indigo, the cancellation rate of its tickets is the lowest i.e. 1.17 percent.

IndiGo has a total of 410 aircraft in its fleet. These fly to 88 domestic and 34 international destinations. Indigo also claims that it proved to be the most punctual airline in the year 2023.