IndiGo chairman apologises for chaos, denies charges of ‘engineering’ crisis to circumvent rules

IndiGo Chairman and Non-Executive Independent Director Vikram Singh Mehta publicly apologised on Wednesday for the flight disruptions and denied any intentional wrongdoing by the airline, saying the carrier is committed to cooperating fully with regulatory investigations and regaining trust. In his apology, Mehta refuted the allegations that the airline had engineered the crisis to circumvent new pilot rest rules. In the eight-minute video message shared on X, Mehta acknowledged that the airline “let customers down,” and said that the operations are “back to normal, earlier than expected.” Mehta said the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) is examining the chain of events that led to thousands of passengers being stranded across the country.

He also added that IndiGo will appoint external technical experts to work alongside management “to determine the root causes and ensure this level of disruption never occurs again.”

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“There are some allegations that are untrue,” he said. “That IndiGo engineered the crisis. That we tried to influence government rules. That we compromised safety. These claims are incorrect. We operated under the updated pilot fatigue rules throughout July and November and did not attempt to bypass them.”

He described December 3-5 as days when an “unexpected chain of events” overwhelmed the airline’s systems, citing minor technical snags, winter-schedule adjustments, adverse weather, congestion across the aviation network, and the transition to updated crew rostering norms. “This is not an excuse. This is simply the truth,” he said, calling the episode a “blemish on the company’s pristine record.”

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IndiGo has resumed full operations, flying 1,900 services across 138 destinations with normal punctuality levels, he said.

He admitted that regaining public confidence will take time, and said, “Our company has erred. It has to win back your trust. It will depend on actions, not words.”

IndiGo also posted a public update on X, saying all 65,000 employees were working “with all hands on deck” to restore operations.

“Please have faith in us. We are getting there,” the statement read.

Union Civil Aviation Minister K Rammohan Naidu had blamed the disruption on IndiGo’s lapses and promised strict action. The DGCA has decided to constitute an Oversight Team that will be deployed to the airline’s corporate office in Gurugram to look into several aspects, including total fleet, pilot numbers, crew utilisation and unplanned leaves.

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“Even as Indigo operations across the country have stabilised, we continue to closely oversee the operations through the Ministry’s Control Room,” Naidu said on X. “A regular vigil is being maintained for real-time resolution of passenger grievances and the Control Room team is making all efforts to further enhance response time for prompt and effective redressal of passenger concerns.”

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