Whose Reputation Crisis Is It? 

The disruption at IndiGo this week began as an operational crisis: hundreds of delayed flights, crew scheduling failures, and mounting passenger complaints. But the fallout is now squarely reputational, and it’s no longer limited to India’s largest airline. What started as one company’s meltdown is quickly becoming a sector-wide credibility issue. Indian aviation just had one of those weeks that reveals uncomfortable truths about who really calls the shots. And who pays the price when things fall apart!

Remember that this comes just six months after one of the worst airline crashes in aviation history. And yet, here we are, (once again!) willing to let safety take a backseat, even as we see unfold what’s perhaps one of the worst ever examples of corporate callousness and profiteering. Given that IndiGo Airlines controls nearly 60% of India’s domestic aviation market, the crisis is not just the immediate one of stranded passengers but a mind-boggling gamble being taken with lives in Indian skies. 

If you look at what went down in Indian aviation this week, IndiGo seemed like the biggest reputation loser at first. The visuals have been damning: stranded passengers, confused ground staff, and that uniquely Indian brand of airport pandemonium. For a carrier that moves nearly half the country's air passengers, the optics couldn't have been worse. By all means, this should have meant a mega reputational crisis for IndiGo Airlines. But as column after column points out how this was done with at least some level of intentional complicity, clearly, the airline doesn’t worry about this as a reputation crisis and was quite willing to cause this level of disruption to get its way.

And I thought we were meant to stand up to bullies, not reward them.

Held Hostage
Every editorial, every expert column, every talking head on business television is asking the same uncomfortable question: Did India's aviation regulators just get played? Over the last two days, it's clear the DGCA and Aviation Ministry are taking some real beating too. Every commentary piece is hammering them for caving in to what's being called a blatant manipulation, with a single airline basically holding the country hostage. 

The airport chaos created enough pressure that the government gave the airlines an extension. In reports this morning, they have claimed and insisted this is a strictly one-off extension and not a dilution of safety rules, announcing the initiation of an inquiry. Will all this criticism push DGCA to demand actual accountability instead of letting airlines flagrantly ignore rules and safety standards? India’s domestic passenger numbers are at record highs: 156 million passengers in 2023-24, the highest ever. Who is looking after these passengers' safety and rights? 

Which brings us to the passengers. Will we remember this moment? Will we hold airlines accountable with the only power we truly have - our choice of carrier? Will we remember this moment and vote with our wallets? It’s true that Indian flyers have few real choices. Railways cannot absorb the demand for long-distance, time-sensitive travel. Road travel is neither viable nor predictable across states. Will we be compelled to accept whatever the airlines dish out, even when it compromises our safety? Are we willing to pay with our lives, and do Indian passengers have any agency?

And finally, is Air India missing a huge opportunity to win some much-needed brand love for itself? Had they responded with empathy and a gesture of goodwill to stranded Indian passengers rather than the short-term mercenary price hikes, offering capped fares to the affected passengers, the crisis-struck Air India could have launched a wonderful "We've got you covered" campaign. The brand equity they could have built in a single week would have been worth far more than whatever they got from charging bloodthirsty rates. Talk of being penny-wise and pound-foolish!

Note: DGCA has failed to step in (at least till the time of this writing) to stop other airlines from exorbitant pricing. A quick Delhi – Mumbai check on MakeMyTrip shows a return flight for usual morning time travel could be ₹60,000-70,000 per person! 

So, whose reputation is really hit? IndiGo Airlines? Indian Aviation? Aviation Ministry & DGCA with the Indian Government? Who should act fast? Customers? Government? Other Airlines? 

Because the takeaway from this week is simple: this wasn’t just IndiGo’s crisis. It became Indian aviation’s credibility stress test. And the results are not reassuring.