Three groups blame companies of excluding locals from hiring in the country.
DGCA Deputy Director P K Chattopadhyay will head the probe. He has been appointed the Inspector of the Inquiry, official sources said.
Air services of cash-strapped Kingfisher airlines were badly hit on Sunday with almost half of its flights from major metros cancelled or delayed, causing hardship to passengers and prompting aviation regulator DGCA to contemplate action against the beleaguered carrier.
It is not often that the head of a regulator is removed by the nodal ministry, even after the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC), headed by the prime minister, clears an extension.
Under the guidelines, pilots have less time to fly and airlines say they will have to recruit 20 to 25 per cent more pilots, at a time when there is a shortage of pilots across the globe. The DGCA has included non-flying hours within an overall annual duty cap of 1,600 hours per pilot, within which the number of flying hours has been capped at 1,000 hours a year.
Having failed to receive their May salary as assured by the Kingfisher management, the airline pilots have now threatened to approach DGCA if they did not meet the commitment by today even as the regulator maintained that the issue is out of its purview.
This is the third incident of technical malfunction on a Go First aircraft in two days.
The aviation regulator is investigating the incidents and both planes, with Pratt and Whitney engines, will fly only when cleared by it, the officials said.
As SpiceJet faces heat from the aviation regulator DGCA for multiple flight incidents in the last few weeks, malfunction cases involving planes of IndiGo and Vistara came to light on Wednesday.
Two of the cabin crew in the aircraft were also found to be without any proper training, they said.
With airlines reporting multiple technical malfunction incidents, aviation regulator DGCA on Monday said it conducted spot checks and found that there is an insufficient number of engineering personnel certifying planes of various carriers before their departure. Before each departure, an aircraft is checked and certified by an aircraft maintenance engineer (AME). The DGCA has now issued guidelines for airlines on the deployment of AME personnel and directed them to comply by July 28.
International Lease Finance said on Monday it had removed one of six aircraft stranded in India by the dispute over the suspension of operations at Kingfisher Airlines. This decision comes after the DGCA's meeting with Airports Authority of India and the civil aviation ministry.
In an unprecedented action, Indian aviation regulator DGCA has directed low-cost airline Spicejet to operate only 50 per cent of its flights for eight weeks. This follows an unusually high number of incidents involving the airline, raising safety concerns. The curtailment of capacity is unlikely to have any commercial impact on the airline owned by entrepreneur Ajay Singh. SpiceJet already operates less than 50 per cent of the flights it had filed for the summer schedule.
An airline official said the ban is with immediate effect and is in addition to the 30-day ban it had imposed on the individual earlier.
The new regulator will be called Civil Aviation Authority that will also administer financial matters.
Earlier this month, Air India issued show cause notices to the Pilot-in-Command and four crew members of the flight and derostered them pending investigation.
Prabhat Kumar, who has been appointed as the DGCA chief three months ago, is taking steps to ensure safety of passengers.
The sources said that during the boarding, the male passenger behaved in an unruly manner and touched the female cabin crew member inappropriately.
The aviation regulator has also laid down training guidelines for the flight crew to handle the new facility being given to the air travellers.
In a move which could affect the Jet-Etihad deal or start-up carriers like Tata-SIA or AirAsia India, DGCA has made it clear that foreign airlines or investors would not have the right to control the management of an Indian carrier.
"We will not regulate fares but there are cases of airlines charging very high fares in a particular route and such airlines will be asked to explain the reasons for that. They cannot charge such high fares without any valid reason," said a civil aviation ministry official.
HC asks DGCA not to de-register SpiceJet planes till April 6.
The Directorate General of Civil Aviation has asked senior officials of the airlines, including CEO Sanjay Aggarwal, to appear before it tomorrow to explain the cancellations.
Aviation regulator DGCA has allowed IndiGo to wet lease wide-body Boeing planes from Turkish Airlines for up to six months and has rejected the domestic carrier's request for leasing the aircraft for up to two years, according to sources. The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) turned down the request of the country's largest airline to wet lease the aircraft for a longer period, citing that the move could become diversion of traffic rights in collusion with a strong foreign carrier that will mainly feed the latter's hub abroad with more passengers from India, the sources said. IndiGo, which currently has only narrow-body planes in its fleet, decided to lease wide-body aircraft to operate more flights on international routes to meet rising demand.
The incident which took place on Friday came close on the heels of two mid-air urinating incidents on the international flights of Tata Group-run private carrier Air India late last year.
The government is not considering closure of any airline, new DGCA chief Prashant Sukul said on Thursday while rubbishing reports that his predecessor, E K Bharat Bhushan, was removed for taking a tough stand against Kingfisher Airlines.
Indian aviation regulator DGCA has barred 90 SpiceJet pilots from operating the Boeing 737 Max aircraft after finding them not properly trained. "For the moment, we have barred these pilots from flying the Max and they have to retrain successfully for flying the aircraft," DGCA chief Arun Kumar said in a statement. He also said that the regulator will take "strict action against those found responsible for the lapse."
'For the moment, we have barred these pilots from flying the Max and they have to retrain successfully for flying the aircraft,' DGCA chief Arun Kumar said in a statement.
The DGCA report, a copy of which is with Business Standard, stated that under the Madras high court direction, an inspection was carried out by a team headed by V K Arora, deputy director general, DGCA.
But the regulator has dropped the proposal of asking flyers to maintain 30 seconds of silence.
According to e-mails accessed by ANI, the Air India cabin crew supervisor had reportedly sent out emails on November 27 at around 1 pm to the head of the Inflight Service Department (IFSD), base operations in India, Lead HR head of IFSD, and head of the northern region of IFSD and of complaints (customer care), informing them about the incident.
DGCA would look into the tariff structure of Indian airlines in view of the wide range of the base prices of air tickets, after the Supreme Court observed that the price bands were too wide and directed it to examine the matter.
Regulator says that it if Kingfisher is prepared to run the airlines DGCA is ready to renew license. However, the proposal from the airlines will be examined in all aspects before taking decision on revoking its license.
The Bombay High Court on Friday asked the Directorate General of Civil Aviation to conduct an inquiry into allegations of pilots procuring flying license after submitting forged mark sheets.
The airline on Thursday night extended its partial lockout till October 12 as talks between its management and employees failed to break the deadlock over non-payment of salaries for the last seven months.
The Directorate General of Civil Aviation has ordered a probe into the incident.
The Directorate General of Civil Aviation began an inquiry into the emergency landing of a helicopter on the terrace of a five-storey residential apartment building as the chopper was dismantled on Friday.
In recent times, there have been various incidents of unruly passengers onboard domestic and international flights.
The average fares charged by Jet Airways and its low-cost carrier arm Jet Konnect were higher than the average industry fares on almost all routes, according to a monthly internal analysis for July by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA).
© 2026 Rediff.com - Investor Information - Advertise with us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy - Sitemap - Feedback - About us - Terms of use - Grievances