Thousands of passengers left stranded after IndiGo flights were canceled last week [AFP via Getty Images]
Last week, Manjuri carried her husband’s coffin from one town to another in India’s northeast, hoping to catch a flight that would take him hundreds of miles — to the city of Calcutta — for his final goodbyes.
But the difficult journey became unbearable when delays by IndiGo, the country’s largest airline, left it stranded for hours before the flight was finally canceled.
Manjuri was among hundreds of thousands of passengers whose plans were upended when IndiGo’s sudden wave of cancellations plunged India’s aviation sector into one of its worst crises in years.
A series of delays suddenly turned into more than 1,000 cancellations on Dec. 5, stranding families and missing weddings, funerals and vital exams.
Once the poster child for India’s low-cost aviation boom – with a 60% market share and 2,000 daily flights – IndiGo now risks losing its hard-earned reputation as the country’s reliable, no-frills carrier, experts say.
“IndiGo could suffer significant financial damage due to loss of revenue due to flight cancellations, refunds and other compensation to affected customers, as well as possible sanctions imposed by the DGCA. [the aviation regulator]“Moody’s, a rating agency.
At the heart of the crisis are new crew assignment rules that grant more rest to pilots and cabin crew – changes that IndiGo is accused of failing to plan for, leaving it short of legally rested staff and forcing it to ground more than half its fleet.
The rules include longer weekly rest for pilots (48 hours instead of 36) and stricter limits on night landings (two instead of six) after years of fatigue complaints to the regulator.
With 60% market share in India, IndiGo is the largest airline in the country. [AFP via Getty Images]
India’s aviation watchdog introduced the new customs rules almost two years ago to align with global standards, with airlines expected to adopt them in two phases – in June and November this year.
While other major carriers like Air India claim to have implemented them, IndiGo has admitted that it has not been able to do so fully on time.
“Did they do this because adopting the new rules would have required them to hire hundreds of new pilots and increase costs?” Mark Martin, an aviation expert, told the BBC.
“They had several months’ notice to implement the rules. All their competitors had complied. Why couldn’t IndiGo intervene?” he asked.
In several statements, the airline apologized for the cancellations, acknowledging “unforeseen operational challenges” – from bad weather to “errors of judgment and planning lapses” in implementing the now-withdrawn pilot fatigue rules.
But at least three IndiGo pilots the BBC spoke to said the crisis reflected a deeper problem at the airline as it sought to make savings, even at the cost of pilot fatigue.
“Working overtime may be normal in some industries, but aviation is a very safety-oriented profession, where fatigue is a silent killer. You don’t even know its effects until it’s too late,” said a pilot who has worked for the airline for more than a decade, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Besides the focus on costs, IndiGo’s aggressive expansion, including the launch of new international routes, “may have also diverted its management from looking at the ‘boring’ details.” [of rest norms]”, wrote GR Gopinath, founder of the now-defunct Air Deccan, in the Economic Times newspaper.
He also blamed the airline’s undisputed dominance in the aviation sector: with a 60% market share in India, the company transports more than 100 million passengers every year.
“In practice, the airline is now a monopoly. And what comes with monopolies is indifference,” Mr. Gopinath wrote.
Delays were so widespread that some passengers had to spend days camping at airports [AFP via Getty Images]
Over the past 15 years, several Indian airlines – from Jet Airways to Kingfisher to GoAir – have collapsed under debt or crushing fuel and engine costs. As its competitors disappeared, IndiGo quickly filled the gaps, expanding into smaller cities and back roads where its blue and white planes became synonymous with air travel.
Changing market dynamics have enabled the carrier to consolidate a level of market share that no Indian airline has held in decades.
But the airline’s lean operations, which deliver savings in stable times, “lacked the resilience necessary for this regulatory change, leading to the need for a system-wide restart that led to the cancellation of approximately 1,600 flights on Dec. 5,” ratings agency Moody’s said.
As the crisis deepened, IndiGo was granted a one-time exemption from the new rules until February and said its operations would stabilize between December 10 and 15.
But in a strongly worded letter to the regulator, the Airline Pilots Association of India says this has undermined the very spirit of the new regulations “and has seriously compromised the safety of the traveling public”.
The BBC asked IndiGo to respond to its pilots’ comments and the claims in the Pilots Association letter, but the airline refused.
Experts told the BBC that IndiGo could take years to recover, with lasting effects on its finances, security and reputation, amid ongoing concerns about its declining punctuality.
Some 54% of passengers who flew with the airline reported an on-time issue in the past 12 months, according to a recent survey conducted by online community platform LocalCircles. And its on-time performance fell to 68% in November from 84% in October, according to Moody’s.
The airline asked for a delay until mid-December to resolve the crisis [Reuters]
Since the start of the crisis, IndiGo’s share price has fallen in Mumbai as investors fear higher costs due to operational disruptions and increased crew expenses due to the new rules.
But the biggest challenge will be to regain the trust of the millions of passengers who swear by the brand.
“IndiGo has shot itself in the foot and caused irreparable damage to its brand,” Mr Martin said. “Other airlines will go after IndiGo passengers.”
Carriers like Air India and Spice Jet have already started doing so, announcing hundreds of additional flights to accommodate affected IndiGo passengers.
Given the situation, the airline may also have difficulty filling vacant pilot positions, says Martin.
The issue was discussed in Parliament on Monday, with India’s aviation minister warning the airline against taking “very strict action”.
India’s aviation regulator has issued a show cause notice to IndiGo, citing “significant deficiencies in planning and oversight”, and has reportedly asked the airline to reduce its flight schedule by 5%.
It is unclear how the airline will be held accountable, but this is a “golden opportunity for the regulator to focus on setting a good example with IndiGo”, says aviation expert Ameya Joshi. The BBC has contacted the regulator for comment.
“We have a case where a well-capitalized airline was unable to perform a fundamental task. The country is looking to the regulator and the ministry,” Mr Joshi said.
