‘Sorry’ to travelers

December 10, 2025

IndiGo chief executive Pieter Elbers on Monday issued a public apology to passengers and said the airline has fully stabilised its operations after last week’s severe disruption that led to more than 4,500 flight cancellations across the country. Thousands of travellers had been stranded as the airline struggled to manage schedules, refunds and baggage handling.

In a video statement, Elbers said IndiGo was “back on its feet”, with its full network restored across all 138 destinations. He said that as of December 9, all flights listed on the airline’s website were operating on the adjusted schedule. According to him, the airline has completed a large share of refunds for affected passengers and continues to return pending baggage.Elbers acknowledged the scale of the disruption and admitted that the carrier had “let customers down”. He said air travel involves people’s plans and commitments, and the airline’s focus during the crisis was to ensure stranded passengers reached their destinations.

He added that the entire IndiGo team had worked continuously to move delayed travellers either to their final destinations or back home. Refunds were issued immediately, he said, and the company remains committed to completing payments for pending cases.On baggage delays, Elbers said most bags stuck at airports had been returned to customers, and remaining deliveries were in progress. He added that the airline’s on time performance had normalised with the full route network active again.Elbers also said IndiGo was cooperating closely with regulators. Now that the immediate situation was under control, the airline had begun examining the reasons behind the disruption. He said the company intended to draw lessons from the crisis and strengthen its internal processes.The government has moved to cut IndiGo’s winter schedule following the disruptions.

Civil Aviation Minister Ram Mohan Naidu said the airline’s network of about 2,200 routes would be reduced, with some slots reassigned to other carriers. These routes could be restored once IndiGo demonstrated that it could operate them reliably. Separately, the DGCA has asked IndiGo to scale down operations by 5 percent, which translates to roughly 115 fewer flights a day from its usual 2,300 daily services.Despite the turmoil, the airline’s stock rose 1.31 percent to Rs 4,988 on the NSE on Monday. However, IndiGo shares have lost more than 13 percent over the past five trading sessions as investors reacted to the ongoing operational crisis.