Former Delhi Police chief Bassi appointed UPSC member

May 31, 2016

New Delhi, May 31: B S Bassi, who had a controversial tenure as Delhi Police Commissioner with frequent run-ins with the AAP government, was today appointed a member of UPSC, a Constitutional post, with a five year tenure.

The Government cleared the name of 60-year-old Bassi as member of the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC), which conducts the civil services examination to select IAS and IPS officers among others. The Commission has a maximum strength of 10 members besides a Chairperson.

A 1977 batch IPS officer of Arunachal Pradesh-Goa-Mizoram and Union Territories (AGMUT) cadre, Bassi retired as Delhi Police chief in February this year after completing 60 years.

He will have a tenure of about five years till February, 2021. Under the Constitution, a member of the UPSC can have a maximum of six years tenure or till he attains age of 65 years.

Bassi's tenure as Delhi Police Commissioner, especially towards the end, had come for criticism after the arrest of Jawaharlal Nehru University Students Union (JNUSU) President Kanhaiya Kumar over sedition row. The former police Chief was involved in a running battle with the AAP government led by Arvind Kejriwal.

The UPSC is headed by a chairman besides maximum of ten members. With Bassi's appointment, the Commission is in its full strength.

Alka Sirohi, David R Syiemlieh, Manbir Singh, Former Navy Vice Chief D K Dewan, Vinay Mittal, Chhatar Singh, Prof Hem Chandra, Arvind Saxena and Prof Pradeep Kumar Joshi are other members of the UPSC, headed by Deepak Gupta as its Chairman.

The members to the Commission are mainly experts drawn from various streams which includes the IAS, IPS and other All India services.

It had former CBI Director A P Singh as one of its member, representing the IPS. However, after his name was linked to controversial meat exporter Moin Qureshi, he tendered his resignation in January 2015.

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IndiGo CEO says less than 1,000 cancellations on Dec 6; normalcy by Dec 15

News Network

December 5,2025

New Delhi, Dec 5: IndiGo CEO Pieter Elbers issued a public apology this evening after more than a thousand flights were cancelled today, making it the "most severely impacted day" in terms of cancellations. The biggest airline of the country cancelled "more than half" of its daily number of flights on Friday, said Elbers. He also said that even though the crisis will persist on Saturday, the airline anticipates fewer than 1,000 flight cancellations.

"Full normalisation is expected between December 10 and 15, though IndiGo cautions that recovery will take time due to the scale of operations," the IndiGo CEO said.

IndiGo operates around 2,300 domestic and international flights daily.

Pieter Elbers, while apologising for the major inconvenience due to delays and cancellations, said the situation is a result of various causes.

The crisis at IndiGo stems from new regulations that boost pilots' weekly rest requirements by 12 hours to 48 and allow only two night-time landings per week, down from six. IndiGo has attributed the mass cancellations to "misjudgment and planning gaps".

Elbers also listed three lines of action that the airline will adopt to address the issue.

"Firstly, customer communication and addressing your needs, for this, messages have been sent on social media. And just now, a more detailed communication with information, refunds, cancellations and other customer support measures was sent," he said.

The airline has also stepped up its call centre capacity.

"Secondly, due to yesterday's situation, we had customers stranded mostly at the nation's largest airports. Our focus was for all of them to be able to travel today itself, which will be achieved. For this, we also ask customers whose flights are cancelled not to come to the airports as notifications are sent," the CEO said.

"Thirdly, cancellations were made for today to align our crew and planes to be where they need to start tomorrow morning afresh. Earlier measures of the last few days, regrettable, have proven not to be enough, but we have decided today to reboot all our systems and schedules, resulting in the highest numbers of cancellations so far, but imperative for progressive improvements starting from tomorrow," he added.

As airports witnessed chaotic scenes, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) stepped in to grant IndiGo a temporary exemption from stricter night duty rules for pilots. It also allowed substitution of leaves with a weekly rest period.

Civil Aviation Minister Ram Mohan Naidu has said a high-level inquiry will be ordered and accountability will be fixed.

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