India’s aviation regulators on Wednesday imposed hefty fines on three airline services and the Mumbai airport operator for not following standard operating procedures and security protocols.

According to orders issued by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) and Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS), the Mumbai International Airport Ltd (MIAL) has to pay a total fine of Rs 90 lakh, while IndiGo has to pay up Rs 1.2 crore. Air India and SpiceJet have to pay a fine of Rs 30 lakh each.

The BCAS and DGCA have imposed a fine of Rs 60 lakh and Rs 30 lakh, respectively, on MIAL. The BCAS has imposed a fine of Rs 1.2 crore on IndiGo over a failure to adhere to security measures regarding the incident where passengers were seen eating on the tarmac as per a video that went viral.

The DGCA has imposed a fine of Rs 30 lakh each on Air india and SpiceJet regarding the rostering of pilots during the onset of foggy conditions.

Many passengers rushed out of an IndiGo aircraft at the Mumbai airport, sat on the tarmac, and some were also seen having food there as soon as their diverted Goa-Delhi flight landed after a long delay on January 14. The aviation regulators had issued show-cause notices to IndiGo and MIAL saying they were not proactive in anticipating the situation and making the appropriate facilitation arrangements for passengers at the airport.

The DGCA, in its order dated January 17, said the reply to a show-cause notice received was found to be unsatisfactory as the response submitted by MIAL shows that it has failed to adhere to the safety requirements as laid down in the “Air Safety Circular 04 of 2007”.

On the issue of rostering of pilots, the penalty imposed was over failure in complying with instructions issued as per minutes of meeting on low-visibility operations and fog preparedness held on November 6, 2023. Earlier, the DGCA had issued a show-cause notice to the airlines for rostering “non-CAT III compliant pilots” during low visibility at the Delhi airport that led to many diversions of Delhi-bound flights.

After analysing the flight delay/cancellation/diversion-related data submitted by scheduled airlines for December 2023, DGCA found that Air India and SpiceJet did not roster “CAT II/III and LVTO qualified pilots for some of the flights”, an official said.

CAT II/III pertains to operating flights in low-visibility conditions. LVTO refers to low visibility take-off.

During December 25-28 last year, flight operations were significantly impacted at the Delhi airport, and nearly 60 flights of various airlines were diverted due to dense fog.