Air India Express cancels 75 flights, normal operations to start from May 12

Air India Express, a low-cost carrier subsidiary of Air India, faced significant disruption on Friday, canceling around 75 flights.

While the exact reason for the cancellations remains undisclosed, an official statement from Air India Express assures passengers that normal operations are expected to resume by Sunday, May 12. The airline is currently working on rectifying the operational issues that caused the disruptions.

An airline official estimated the cancellations to result in a revenue loss of approximately Rs 30 crore.

On Thursday, the airline owned by Tata Group said it's canceling 85 flights, which is about 20% of its usual daily flights. This is because they don't have enough cabin crew available. They also mentioned that on Thursday, they'll only be operating 283 flights, but Air India will be helping out on 20 routes.

This comes after the airline fired 30 crew members who took sudden sick leave, causing flight disruptions. This led to over 100 flight cancellations since Tuesday, affecting around 15,000 passengers.

Rest of the sick crew members were given an ultimatum to return to work until 4 pm on Thursday or lose their jobs. The airline also offered affected passengers full refunds or rescheduling for delayed flights beyond three hours at no extra charge.

The airline sent termination notices to the crew members, stating their actions showed they deliberately avoided work without a valid reason. They mentioned this violated both laws and the airline's service rules. Aloke Singh, the CEO expressed regret over the situation caused by a few crew members, highlighting the dedication of the majority of the airline's staff to serving passengers.

"This act is certainly not representative of the 2,000-odd cabin crew colleagues in the company who continue to respond to the call of duty and serve our guests with dedication and pride. I am thankful to all who are standing by the airline in this hour of crisis," Singh said in a statement.

The Ministry of Civil Aviation asked Air India Express for a report on flight cancellations and delays. They want the airline to quickly fix the issues and help affected passengers according to regulations. The disruptions started Tuesday night because of a sudden lack of crew members.