IndiGo Collapse: Employees' Viral Letter Points To Planning Failure

Amid largescale flight cancellations and chaos at multiple airports, a purported "open letter" from staff at IndiGo - including pilots, cabin crew and ground-staff - is going viral on social media. The letter, shared widely online, claims that the recent chaos was "not just an operational failure - they were a failure of planning and frontline protection". So far, more than 500 flights have been cancelled and videos have emerged of passengers stranded at various airports across the country, struggling to get food and water.

Also Read | All IndiGo Domestic Flights Out Of Delhi Cancelled Till Midnight Today

The alleged signatories mentioned in the letter say that, while employees bore the brunt of passenger anger, abuse and blame, strategic decisions that triggered the collapse remained distant from the consequences. Crucially, they argue, the timing, scale and pattern of the cancellations coincide with a new regulatory deadline affecting crew-duty norms. That, they claim, makes it "impossible to ignore" what is happening on the ground: the operational collapse appears to have been allowed to escalate so that frontline staff became "leverage in a regulatory standoff".

"We did not design rosters. We did not freeze hiring. We did not delay preparedness. Yet we carried the entire public cost," the letter reads. The staff demand a public admission of responsibility, exoneration of frontline employees, transparency on whether regulatory pressure was part of a strategy - and assurance that such a crisis will not repeat.

OPEN LETTER – FROM INDIGO PILOTS, CREW & GROUND STAFF

The recent mass disruptions were not just an operational failure — they were a failure of planning and frontline protection.

Across airports, it was employees who faced passenger anger, public blame, and personal abuse,…

— Sanjay Lazar (@sjlazars) December 5, 2025

One of the users who shared the letter online says this was received as a forwarded message on WhatsApp. NDTV cannot vouch for the authenticity of the letter.

In the last four days, major hubs - Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad and others - have seen cancellations running into the hundreds. IndiGo operates around 2,300 flights daily and its on-time performance plunged to 19.7 per cent on December 3.

Also Read | As IndiGo Runs Into Turbulence, A Look At Performance Of Indian Airlines

The airline's leadership has acknowledged the crisis. In a letter to employees, CEO Pieter Elbers admitted that IndiGo "could not live up" to its promise of reliable service and attributed the disruptions to a confluence of factors: new crew-rostering rules under the revised Flight Duty Time Limitation (FDTL), technical glitches, airport congestion and adverse weather. 

What is FDTL

FDTL norms cap the number of hours a crew member can be on duty.  The rules limit flying to 8 hours a day, 35 hours a week, 125 hours a month and 1,000 hours a year. 

FDTL also specify mandatory rest periods, requiring that every crew member receive downtime amounting to twice the duration of their flight time, with a minimum of 10 hours of rest within any 24-hour window.

This was brought in by the DGCA to ensure pilots and cabin crew get sufficient rest and are not pushed into fatigue that could compromise safety.