IndiGo’s profits, people’s peril

Few would shed tears for IndiGo over the Rs 22.20 crore penalty imposed by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation.

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If anything, the tens of thousands of passengers—and the anxious relatives who waited endlessly outside terminals—might even consider the fine modest, given the scale of suffering inflicted during the three days of near-total aviation chaos in early December. IndiGo is not a fledgling carrier struggling to find its feet; it is India’s largest airline, with a pan-India footprint and a market presence that borders on the monopolistic. With that dominance comes responsibility—towards passengers, staff, and the system that enables civil aviation to function safely and predictably. That responsibility, the DGCAS inquiry makes clear, was cavalierly abdicated. The disruptions were not caused by bad weather, geopolitical shocks, or unforeseeable technical failures; they were the direct outcome of management choices,