The crash has led to heightened scrutiny of Air India and the aviation watchdog. Amid obvious questions, experts say there are learnings for the entire sector
Investigators scour the scene as a crane retrieves part of the fuselage of the crashed Air India Boeing 787 Dreamliner flight AI 171 on June 14 in Ahmedabad
Image: Ritesh Shukla / Getty Images
An unfortunate crash in the world’s fastest-growing aviation market has turned the heat on its oldest airline and its regulator.
Since Air India’s flight AI 171 crashed during take off in Ahmedabad on June 12, the country’s aviation sector, which was clocking some serious growth, has been dealing with a fair bit of uncertainty, concerns, and even scares, with technical snags, cancellations and emergency landings seeing a rise.
While a significant number of these disruptions were faced by Air India, IndiGo too had some scares. On June 21, a flight operated by India’s largest airline made an emergency landing in Bengaluru after pilots declared ‘mayday’ due to “insufficient fuel”, according to reports. Air India, meanwhile, has temporarily reduced both domestic and international operations, raising eyebrows among flyers.
As if these weren’t enough, on June 21, India’s aviation watchdog, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), asked the Tata group-owned Air India to remove three officials, including a divisional vice president, from all roles and responsibilities related to crew scheduling and rostering over serious lapses. “Repeated and serious violations voluntarily disclosed by Air India concerning flight crew being scheduled and operated despite lapses in licensing, rest and recency requirements,” says the DGCA order.
“We must realise that for any airline, anywhere in the world, an accident of this scale will certainly lead to many questions being asked,” says Jitender Bhargava, executive director at Air India, and author of The Descent of Air India. “But it will certainly bounce back, and ultimately what we are seeing will only be a temporary setback.”
(This story appears in the 11 July, 2025 issue of Forbes India. To visit our Archives, click here.)