DGCA Orders Air India To Remove 3 Officials Over Crew Rostering Lapses, Warns Of Operator License Withdrawal

Mumbai: In a rare strong-worded order, the Indian civil aviation regulator has directed Air India to remove three senior officials from their duties citing repeated serious lapses in crew rostering. The Director General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) gave a final warning to the airline that any future violation may attract action as strict as withdrawal of operator permissions.

Since the Air India flight AI-171 crashed into a medical college’s hostel soon after it took-off from Ahmedabad airport on June 12 killing 241 people onboard, the civil aviation regulator has issued a series of notices to the airline. On June 13, DGCA directed enhanced safety checks on Air India’s Boeing 787-8/9 fleet, which has caused severe operational disruptions for the airline.

On Friday, DGCA ordered Air India to remove three senior officials from all roles and responsibilities related to crew scheduling and rostering after discovering failures in crew scheduling, compliance monitoring and internal accountability.

The officials involved in this order include divisional vice president Choorah Singh, chief manager of crew scheduling Pinky Mittal as well as Payal Arora, who overlooked crew scheduling and planning. It has also asked the airline to initiate internal disciplinary proceedings against them and submit the report to the regulator within 10 days, until which the officials shall be reassigned to non-operational roles.

DGCA said that these officials were involved in serious lapses including unauthorised and non-compliant crew pairings, violation of mandatory licensing and recency norms as well as systemic failures in scheduling protocol and oversight.

It observed that these violations were discovered during the post-transition review from ARMS to the CAE Flight and Crew Management System. While it noted that the violations were voluntarily reported by Air India, it raised concerns over the absence of strict disciplinary measures against key officials directly responsible for these lapses.

DGCA in a strict instruction warned the airline of future violations of crew scheduling norms, licensing or flight time limitations detected in any post-audit or inspection. It added that such violations will attract strict enforcement action like penalties, license suspension or as stringent as withdrawal of operator permissions.

Notably, DGCA had imposed a fine of Rs 99 lakh on Air India in August 2024 after it had found lapses in crew rostering that paired a trainee pilot with a non-training pilot on an international flight.

Following the notice, Air India issued a statement saying that it has implemented the regulator’s order and the company’s chief operations officer (COO) will provide direct oversight to the integrated operations control centre (IOCC) in the interim period. “Air India is committed to ensuring that there is total adherence to safety protocols and standard practices,” read the statement.

However, aviation experts believe that this order is one of the strongest orders from the civil aviation regulator so far. A few of them also compared it with DGCA’s July 2022 order to SpiceJet directing it to operate only 50% of its fleet after its several aircraft faced technical snags.

Show-Cause Notice To Air India For Flying Aircraft Above Permissible Time Limit

On Friday, DGCA issued a show-cause notice after it observed that Air India operated two flights, AI-133 from Bangalore to London on May 16 and May 17, which exceeded the stipulated flight time limit of 10 hours, violating the Civil Aviation Requirement (CAR).

The notice, reviewed by The Free Press Journal, has asked the airline to show cause within seven days as to why enforcement action should not be initiated against it. “Failure to submit your reply within the stipulated period shall result in the matter being decided ex parte based on the evidence available on record,” read the notice.