The Civil Aviation Minister Kinjarapu Ram Mohan Naidu is facing a crisis, as massive disruption of flight services by Indigo Airlines has put lakhs of passengers to serious inconvenience and also raised questions over the performance of Aviation Ministry.

Owing to the gross negligence and mismanagement of Indigo Airlines, about 1000 flights were cancelled on Friday and about 850 flights were cancelled on Saturday. While there is no doubt that Indigo Airlines is the solely responsible for this chaos, the fact that Aviation Ministry has allowed it happen, raises questions over the capabilities of Civil Aviation Minister and higher officials in his Ministry.

“How did such a large scale mixup occur in Aviation sector, which is considered one of the heavily regulated sectors? What was Aviation Minister doing, when problem was escalating to such serious levels?” is the most pertinent question.

What’s atrocious is, the air fares have skyrocketed after Indigo Airlines cancellations, denoting how callous Airlines operators are and how weak Aviation Ministry’s command on them.

Addressing the crisis, Aviation Minister Ram Mohan Naidu has finally made a statement on Saturday saying, all those responsible for the chaos will be made to pay up and also announced a cap on air fares, reining on irresponsible airlines operators.

But the situation at airports is far from normal and it may take more days for sanity to return to Indian air travel ecosystem. Meanwhile the damage has been done to Ram Mohan Naidu’s reputation as a promising young leader. Hope he makes efforts to get a complete grasp on Aviation Ministry and rein in on erring players to avoid situations like these in the future.