The Competition Commission has ordered a detailed probe against IndiGo for unfair business practices, little over two months after the country’s largest airline cancelled thousands of flights due to operational issues.
In a 16-page order, the Competition Commission of India (CCI) said that by cancelling thousands of flights, which constituted a significant portion of the scheduled capacity, IndiGo effectively withheld its services from the market, creating an artificial scarcity, limiting consumer access to air travel during peak demand.
“Such conduct by a dominant enterprise may be viewed as restricting the provision of services under Section 4(2)(b)(i) of the Act,” the regulator said. Section 4 of the Competition Act pertains to abuse of dominant position.
“Noting that prima facie the airline’s conduct seems to be causing an appreciable adverse effect on competition in India”, CCI ordered a detailed investigation by its Director General (DG).
IndiGo cancellation data
In early December, IndiGo faced massive operational disruptions, and subsequently, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) curtailed the airline’s winter schedule by 10 per cent until February 10.
More than 10.4 lakh passengers were affected by flight cancellations in December, with over 93 per cent of those impacted by IndiGo cancellations.
Latest data shared by the aviation regulator, DGCA, also showed that scheduled domestic airlines shelled out over Rs 24.27 crore in compensation and facilities for flight cancellations that affected more than 10.46 lakh passengers in December. Among them, IndiGo flight cancellations impacted 9.82 lakh passengers in December, and the airline spent Rs 22.74 crore on facilitation.\
The overall cancellation rate of scheduled domestic airlines was 6.92 per cent in December, and that of IndiGo was 9.65 per cent.
During December, a total of 29,212 passenger-related complaints had been received by the scheduled domestic airlines, and the number of complaints per 10,000 passengers carried was at around 20.41, as per the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA).
Airlines’ market share in December
Due to massive flight disruptions in early December, IndiGo’s market share fell to 59.6 per cent from 63.6 per cent in November.
In December, the market share of Air India Group and Akasa Air rose to 29.6 per cent and 5.2 per cent, respectively. The two airlines’ market share stood at 26.7 per cent and 4.7 per cent, respectively.
SpiceJet also saw its market share rise to 4.3 per cent in December from 3.7 per cent in November 2025. State-owned Alliance Air’s market share remained unchanged at 0.4 per cent in December.