Citing that his duty hours were over, the pilot of an Indigo Pune-Bengaluru flight refused to operate the plane, reportedly causing it to be delayed by five hours. The plane (6E 361) was supposed to take off at 12.45 a.m. from Pune on September 24, but it departed at 5.44 a.m. and landed in Bengaluru by 6.49 a.m. The incident came to the limelight after an X user recently shared video clips of furious passengers talking to the crew members. However, is the pilot only to blame?
According to the industry experts, pilots can invite penalties from the DGCA - which can include disciplinary actions on their license. Therefore, it is up to the company to manage the duty timings of the crew, taking all these aspects into account. Indigo, which acknowledged the flight delay on a statement, blamed 'opertional reasons related to flight duty time limitations' for the incident.
