IndiGo flight cancelled, techie couple attends own reception online

IndiGo flight cancelled, techie couple attends own reception online

Mangalore Today News Network

Bengaluru, December 5, 2025: A unique and unexpected scene unfolded in Karnataka’s Hubballi when a newlywed couple had to attend their own reception virtually, after widespread IndiGo flight cancellations prevented them from travelling to the city.

The reception of Medha Kshirsagar of Hubballi and Sangama Das of Odisha’s Bhubaneswar, both software engineers working in Bengaluru, was scheduled to be held at Gujarat Bhavan, Hubballi.

The couple got married in Bhubaneswar on November 23, and a formal reception was arranged at the bride’s hometown on Wednesday.

However, the event took an unusual turn after IndiGo cancelled multiple flights due to an ongoing pilot shortage across the country.

The bride and groom, who had booked tickets from Bhubaneswar to Bengaluru and onwards to Hubballi for December 2, were stranded after their flights were repeatedly delayed from 9 AM on Tuesday until early morning the next day. The flight was eventually cancelled on December 3.

Several relatives travelling via Bhubaneswar-Mumbai-Hubballi also faced cancellations.

With guests already gathered and all preparations in place, the bride’s parents stepped in and sat in the seats reserved for the couple to perform the rituals.

The bride and groom, fully dressed for the occasion in Bhubaneswar, joined the reception through video conferencing.

"The wedding took place on November 23, and we had planned the reception for December 3. But suddenly, at 4 am, the flight was cancelled. We were still hopeful that they might make it, but they couldn’t," said the mother of the bride.

"We felt very bad we had invited so many relatives, and it was impossible to cancel the event at the last minute. So, after discussing as a family, we decided to have the couple attend the reception online and broadcast their participation on the screen," she added.

IndiGo Flight Cancellations

IndiGo has cancelled hundreds of flights across India this week after failing to make sufficient changes to its roster planning to accommodate new government norms.

The flight operations have been hit at the airports in Delhi, Jaipur, Bhopal, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Chennai, and other cities, leaving thousands of passengers stranded.

On Thursday, IndiGo, which says it operates about 2,200 flights daily, cancelled more than 500 flights, the most in a single day in its 20-year history. It told aviation watchdog DGCA that operations are expected to be fully stabilised by February 10 next year and sought temporary relaxations in flight duty norms.

Acknowledging that the flight disruptions happening for the past few days are primarily due to misjudgment and planning gaps in implementing the second phase of the Flight Duty Time Limitations (FDTL) norms, IndiGo also informed the regulator that there will be more cancellations till December 8, and from that day, there will also be a reduction in services.