In the aftermath of widespread operational disruptions faced by IndiGo in early December, the government has initiated steps to redistribute the domestic flight slots that became available after regulatory action against the airline. On Thursday, airlines were formally invited to submit requests expressing interest in operating flights on these vacated slots, according to an official communication issued by the civil aviation ministry.
The move follows a turbulent period between December 3 and 5 last year, when IndiGo cancelled 2,507 flights and delayed another 1,852 services, disrupting travel plans for more than three lakh passengers across airports nationwide. The scale of the disruption prompted strong regulatory scrutiny and intervention.
In response to these lapses, the aviation regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation curtailed IndiGo’s winter flight schedule by 10 per cent. As a result, the airline was required to stop operating services in several time slots, effectively freeing up capacity at multiple airports.
The civil aviation ministry said a committee constituted to oversee the redistribution of IndiGo’s vacated slots held its first meeting on January 13. During this meeting, members discussed the broad framework, process and guiding principles that would govern how these slots would be reassigned to other carriers.
Following these discussions, the committee has now called on airlines to submit their preferences and formal requests for the vacated slots. Airlines have been instructed to route their applications through the concerned airport operators, who will play a role in the final allocation process, subject to regulatory approval and compliance with laid-down conditions.
One of the key conditions specified is that airlines seeking these slots should not discontinue any of their existing routes merely to take advantage of the newly available capacity. The intention, officials indicated, is to ensure network stability and prevent airlines from reshuffling services in a way that could inconvenience passengers.
However, industry response to the redistribution exercise has been muted. A senior airline executive remarked that most carriers are reluctant to take over the slots being vacated by IndiGo, as these largely consist of unattractive timings such as red-eye flights or marginal reductions, like the withdrawal of a single flight from stations where IndiGo operates multiple daily services. According to the executive, there is little commercial incentive for other airlines to step in for such limited or inconvenient slots.
IndiGo remains the country’s largest airline, operating over 2,000 flights daily, and the reduction in its winter schedule represents only a fraction of its overall network. Nevertheless, the December disruptions drew sharp regulatory action.
On January 17, the DGCA imposed penalties totalling Rs 22.20 crore on IndiGo for the operational failures and issued formal warnings to its CEO Pieter Elbers and two other senior executives. The regulator also directed the airline to submit a Rs 50 crore bank guarantee to ensure long-term systemic improvements.
Subsequently, on January 20, the watchdog detailed its findings, stating that the disruptions were rooted in inadequate crew management, insufficient regulatory preparedness at the operator level, and weaknesses in software systems, management structures and operational control mechanisms. The regulator said the airline’s planning processes failed to identify operational risks and did not maintain adequate buffers to absorb disruptions.
According to the DGCA, IndiGo had prioritised maximising utilisation of aircraft, crew and network resources, which resulted in thin roster margins and reduced operational resilience. Crew schedules were reportedly designed at the very limits of permissible duty hours, with heavy reliance on dead-heading, tail swaps and extended duty patterns, leaving little room for recovery when disruptions occurred.
These operational challenges have also reflected in the airline’s financial performance. On Thursday, IndiGo reported a sharp 78 per cent year-on-year decline in profit to Rs 549.1 crore for the quarter ended December 2025. The airline attributed the fall to higher expenses, alongside the impact of operational disruptions, the implementation of new labour laws and adverse currency movements, which together weighed on profitability despite higher revenues.
