Shinde has a life beyond Patna: Khurshid

October 29, 2013

New Delhi, Oct 29: Dismissing BJP criticism on the Union Home Minister attending a Bollywood music launch hours after serial blasts in Patna, Congress leader Salman Khurshid has said Sushilkumar Shinde "has a life beyond Patna".

Khurshid also criticised BJP's Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi for going ahead with the Patna rally despite the blasts, saying "after an event like this happens, you should give up whatever happens".

Defending Shinde for attending the music release of a film just hours after the blast, the External Affairs Minister said, "Shinde has a life beyond Patna....and the awful thing that happened."

"The law and order was the responsibility of the state government and if the state government was to ask Shinde or the Home Ministry to take over something, he would be there on the phone," he said.

Criticising Modi for going ahead with the rally, the External Affairs Minister said, "May I ask was the rally suspended? You criticised Shinde for carrying on with life as usual but nobody has asked questions that nothing happened to Modi, he went on with his speech, not a word about the people who died, because it was not in the script or was it in the script that we had not seen?"

The Union Minister slammed Modi, saying that instead of attending to those injured in the blasts he went ahead with the rally.

"Should you not attend to people who were hurt? Should you not try to find out what has happened? He continued with his speech ....much worse....much worse," he said.

The union minister also took on Modi for criticising the Congress party on the issue of dynasty politics. Referring to Maneka and Varun Gandhi, he said the (Gandhi) family that irks Modi so much are also a part of BJP.

"There is a very eminent leader in BJP Mrs Maneka Gandhi and Mr Varun Gandhi, a young and bright general secretary of the party. For him (Modi), if you leave Congress, then you are not a part of the family but if you are in Congress, then your are a part of the (Gandhi) family."

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Chaos continues as IndiGo cancels more flights including 73 from Bengaluru airport

News Network

December 4,2025

Domestic carrier IndiGo has cancelled over 180 flights from three major airports — Mumbai, Delhi and Bengaluru — on Thursday, December 4, as the airline struggles to secure the required crew to operate its flights in the wake of new flight-duty and rest-period norms for pilots.

While the number of cancellations at Mumbai airport stands at 86 (41 arrivals and 45 departures) for the day, at Bengaluru, 73 flights have been cancelled, including 41 arrivals, according to a PTI report that quoted sources.

"IndiGo cancelled over 180 flights on Thursday at three airports-Mumbai, Delhi and Bengaluru," the source told the news agency.

Besides, it had cancelled as many as 33 flights at Delhi airport for Thursday, the source said, adding, "The number of cancellations is expected to be higher by the end of the day."

The Gurugram-based airline's On-Time Performance (OTP) nosedived to 19.7 per cent at six key airports — Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata, Bengaluru and Hyderabad — on December 3, as it struggled to get the required crew to operate its services, down from almost half of December 2, when it was 35 per cent.

"IndiGo has been facing acute crew shortage since the implementation of the second phase of the FDTL (Flight Duty Time Limitations) norms, leading to cancellations and huge delays in its operations across the airports," a source had told PTI on Wednesday.

Chaos continued at several major airports for the third day on Thursday because of the cancellations.

A spokesperson for the Kempegowda International Airport (KIA) in Bengaluru said that 73 IndiGo flights had been cancelled on Thursday.

At least 150 flights were cancelled and dozens of others delayed on Wednesday, airport sources said, leaving thousands of travellers stranded, according to news agency Reuters.

The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has said it is investigating IndiGo flight disruptions and has asked the airline to submit the reasons for the current situation, as well as its plans to reduce flight cancellations and delays.

It may be mentioned here that the pilots' body, Federation of Indian Pilots (FIP), has alleged that IndiGo, despite getting a two-year preparatory window before the full implementation of new flight duty and rest period norms for cockpit crew, "inexplicably" adopted a "hiring freeze".

The FIP said it has urged the safety regulator, the DGCA, not to approve airlines' seasonal flight schedules unless they have adequate staff to operate their services "safely and reliably" in accordance with the New Flight Duty Time Limitations (FDTL) norms.

In a letter to the DGCA late on Wednesday, the FIP urged the DGCA to consider re-evaluating and reallocating slots to other airlines, which have the capacity to operate them without disruption during the peak holiday and fog season if IndiGo continues to "fail in delivering on its commitments to passengers due to its own avoidable staffing shortages."

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