NEW DELHI: The aviation watchdog Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) issued four show cause notices on Wednesday to Air India in connection with 29 violations over a one-year period. These violations were disclosed voluntarily by the airline.
The violations took place in Air India for nearly a year from June 13, 2024 to June 3, 2025. They relate to rostering issues, violation of flight duty time limitations for cabin crew and providing inadequate cabin crew, said a source. The airline needs to respond within a fortnight.
The New Indian Express has seen all the four notices issued to top officials of Air India across departments.
A notice issued to the Director of Cabin Safety referred to four instances of non-compliance of cabin crew requirements in 2025 for ultra long-haul range flights. The cabin crew requirement was 15. Flight AI 126 carried only 12 of them during a trip on April 27, 2025 while only 14 of them were present on AI 188 (Apr 27), AI 190 (Apr 28) and AI 191 (May 2).
The notice to the Director of Flight Operations referred to weekly rest violations in the case of three specific crew members. Two such violations happened on June 24 last year and one on June 13 this year. “These violations reflect serious deficiencies in crew scheduling, operational planning and regulatory oversight within the flight operations function,” it said. It pointed out repeated warnings had been issued in the past and the recurrence of such violations suggests a failure to establish effective control mechanisms.
A notice was issued to the Cabin Safety Training Manager of Air India for breach of regulatory requirements in case of flight operations – the crew operated flights with a lapsed competency card on April 10 and 11, 2025 as well as from February 16 to May 19. A flight was operated after slide deployment on December 1, 2024, it said.
The Director, Training, of Air India was issued a show cause notice in connection with violations committed by 19 crew members. These include a Supervised Line Flying Release (SLF) check done by a captain 114 days after the simulator training (on July 26, 2024), SLF check by a flying officer 36 days after completion of the second session of Zero Flight Time Training (on October 9, 2024), SLF done by another captain without completion of mandatory Kathmandu simulator training (on April 22, 2025) and 16 crew members not complying with KTM night operation clearance training (identified on June 3, 2025).
An Air India spokesperson said, "We acknowledge receipt of these notices from the regulator related to certain voluntary disclosures that were made over the last one year by Air India. We will respond to the said notices within the stipulated period. We remain committed to the safety of our crew and passengers."
