Govt, police remain alert

At least 97 flights were cancelled and over 150 were delayed in Delhi on Sunday as the Indira Gandhi International (IGI) Airport continued to reel from the closure of 32 airports in western and northern states of India due to ongoing hostilities with Pakistan, even as an agreement to stop all military action was reached on Saturday.

- Jasjeev Gandhiok

NEW DELHI:

According to airport data, 96 of the 97 flights were domestic, and of these 44 were arrivals and 52 were departures. The other one was the only international flight, to Tel Aviv in Israel, to be cancelled.

"The flights impacted included 44 arrivals and 52 departures. Only one international flight was cancelled, which was flight AI-139 to Tel Aviv," said an airport official aware of the matter.

According to flight tracking website FlightRadar, over 150 flights were also delayed on Sunday, with an average delay time of 15 minutes. A day earlier, 60 flights were cancelled and over 200 were delayed.

On Sunday, as many as 32 airports were shut across the country due to security reasons. These are airports primarily in the north, northwest and the western part of the country, close to the Pakistan border. The closure will be effective from "May 9, 2025, to May 14, 2025 (which corresponds to 0529 IST on 15th May 2025), due to operational reasons," the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) said in a release on Saturday.

The Delhi airport is the biggest one still operational in northwest India. Airports in a few nearby cities, such as Dehradun, Lucknow, and Jaipur, among others, are also functioning as of now.