- By Chetna Shree
- Thu, 04 Dec 2025 04:06 PM (IST)
- Source:JND
IndiGo Flight Cancellations: IndiGo is experiencing significant disruptions across several airports, with hundreds of flights cancelled following the rollout of new airline safety norms. While the updated regulations have affected all airlines, IndiGo appears to be facing a comparatively larger impact.
New Airline Safety Norms 2025: What’s Changed?
- Weekly Rest: Increased from 36 hours to 48 hours within each seven-day cycle.
- Night-Duty Window: Expanded from 00:00-05:00 to 00:00-06:00 to cover the full Window of Circadian Low (WOCL).
- Maximum Daily Flight Duty: Now capped at 10 hours when any part of the duty falls within the WOCL, with overall limits made stricter.
- Cumulative Duty (14 Days): Reduced from 100 hours to 95 hours.
- Rest After Night Duty: Increased from 10 hours to 12 hours, or matched to the length of the preceding duty period, whichever is greater.
- Night Landings: Reduced from six to two per roster period.
- Fatigue Management: Shifted from basic regulatory compliance to a mandatory Fatigue Risk Management System (FRMS) that includes predictive fatigue monitoring.
The revised airline safety norms introduce stricter duty-time limits to reduce crew fatigue, enhance safety, and require airlines to adopt scientifically based fatigue-risk management systems. The changes are expected to impact pilot rosters, flight schedules and overall airline operations across the country, Times Now reported.
IndiGo Flight Cancellations: Why IndiGo Was Hit The Hardest?
IndiGo appears to be facing a comparatively larger impact from the new airline safety norms primarily because of the scale at which it operates. IndiGo operates more than 2,200 domestic and international flights a day, which is around twice the daily operations of Air India, the report added.
At this scale, even a 10-20 per cent reduction in capacity can translate to 200-400 disrupted flights, affecting thousands of passengers nationwide.
IndiGo’s business model has also added to its vulnerability. As a low-cost carrier, the airline depends on high-frequency and overnight operations to maximise aircraft utilisation and maintain lower fares, which conflict directly with the DGCA’s stricter limits on night duties, mandatory rest periods, and cumulative flight hours, causing added pressure on crew scheduling and overall operations, Times Now report added.
The Airline Pilots’ Association of India added another dimension to the issue, saying that the airlines were given “barely a two-hour window” to implement the new aviation norms.
“Despite sufficient time being accorded, most airlines started preparing rather late, failing to properly adjust crew rosters, 15 days in advance as required. This suggests an initial managerial underestimation or delay in the strategic planning necessary to provision crew accordingly. While the new norms mandate increased rest periods and other restrictions to combat pilot fatigue, this does not necessarily increase the total number of pilots needed to maintain a schedule,” Airline Pilots’ Association of India said.
The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has summoned IndiGo’s senior management to explain the disruptions and outline measures to resume operations during the peak travel period, when India handles more than five lakh domestic passengers a day.
IndiGo said it has initiated “calibrated adjustments”, a temporary cut in flights, to gradually resume normal operations over the next 48 hours.