18 IndiGo flights fail to depart, several delayed

Eighteen IndiGo flights (eight arrivals and 10 departures) were cancelled and several delayed by hours due to the ongoing operational issues even as passengers continued to suffer for the fourth day on Saturday.

The airline had already announced the cancellation of 13 flights for today on Friday evening.

Passengers complained that officials were not addressing their queries about flight cancellation and refund satisfactorily. Despite repeated phone calls, no IndiGo official at the Shaheed Bhagat Singh International (SBSI) Airport was available for a comment on flight operations for Sunday and later.

Chandigarh Airport CEO Ajay Verma claimed that normalcy will return by Monday. “We are providing chairs to the visitors and adequate arrangement of wheelchairs has been made for physically challenged.”

“The surge in ticket prices of other airlines and ticket availability has been abated to a large extent but there is still no certainty whether a particular flight will leave or not,” said a city-based tour operator.

A Phase-5 travel agent said, “There is no issue of ticket availability or surge in prices now. Yesterday, I sold two tickets for Delhi-Mumbai flight at Rs 45,000 each but this is not the case now. The only problem is there is no clarity on whether the IndiGo flight will go or not.”

The one-way airfare of Chandigarh-Mumbai flight on Sunday ranges between Rs 10,000 and Rs 14,000, Chandigarh-Bengaluru Rs 15,000, Chandigarh-Kolkata Rs 14,000, and Chandigarh-Pune Rs 16,000.

Other travel agents also cautioned that if travelling by air is avoidable, it is better to wait for two-three days so that there is complete clarity. “Those who have pressing reasons to travel are booking tickets, and travelling also. It all depends on the urgency of the traveller,” they said.

The SBSI Airport, Chandigarh, is one of the worst affected airports in the country as IndiGo operates the majority, around 55 arrivals and departures, from here daily. As many as 33 arrivals and departures from here were cancelled on Friday.

IndiGo airlines took early steps to restore normalcy in flight operations at the Chandigarh airport on Saturday morning with a few on-time departures in a bid to reset its operations and re-align with the nationwide network. Till 9 am, flights from Jaipur (7:15 am), Bengaluru (7:30 am), Delhi (7:55 am) and Mumbai (8:20 am) arrived here while the flights to Hyderabad (6:22 am), Chennai (7:21 am), Patna (7:28 am), Jaipur (7:35 am), Delhi (8:45 am) and Mumbai (9:02 am) departed on time. The Abu Dhabi-Chandigarh flight was not scheduled today while the Dubai-Chandigarh flight was delayed by five hours and took off at 8:26 pm. The Chandigarh-Dubai flight departed at 6:21 pm, an hour and a half behind schedule.