DGCA suspends 4 FOIS

Aviation safety regulator, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) on Friday suspended four Flight Operations Inspectors (FOIs) in the wake of IndiGo's unprecedented operational meltdown, which triggered the cancellation of thousands of flights this month and left lakhs of passengers stranded across airports nationwide.

- Dhairya Gajara

The action marks thestrongest regulatory intervention yet in the crisis that has shaken domestic aviation and raised serious questions about oversight, manpower planning, and compliance with new pilot rostering rules.

IndiGo's troubles continued on Friday when the airline cancelled 54 flights from Bengaluru alone, including 31 arrivals and 23 departures, even as disruptions continued across the network. A day earlier, the carrier had scrapped over 200 flights from Delhi and Bengaluru, compounding the chaos for passengers already grappling with long queues, missed connections, and repeated rescheduling.

Sources later confirmed that the cancellations across the two major airports rose to 159 on Friday, with Delhi accounting for 105 cancellations and Bengaluru for 54.