Deaths prompt pilot body nudge to DGCA: Are fatigue safeguards really working?

The series of deaths of airline pilots on duty, training and other operational activities has prompted the Federation of Indian Pilots (FIP) to seek the attention of aviation regulator DGCA (Directorate General of Civil Aviation) to look at a bigger issue: is the protection against pilot fatigue really working?

The FIP, in its September 15 letter to the DGCA, has asked for six interventions. These include withdrawing airline-specific exemptions from the Flight Duty Time Limitation (FDTL) rules; mandatory quarterly disclosure of fatigue reports and Fatigue Risk Management System (FRMS) performance by airlines; scientific study of pilot health trends; and creating a DGCA-led National FRMS Oversight Programme.

The pilots’ body said recent pilot deaths had happened “during operational duty cycles, training activities and crew rest periods” and expressed concerns about “cumulative fatigue, circadian disruption, recovery opportunities and long-term health consequences associated with current operational practices”.

The FIP, however, did not blame any of the deaths on fatigue. “FIP wishes to clarify that no direct causal relationship between fatigue and these individual fatalities has been established through any official investigation,” the federation said.

However, it stated that the events “warrant an urgent and comprehensive review of fatigue exposure, rostering practices, recovery opportunities, medical surveillance and FRMS effectiveness across Indian aviation operations”.

The representation includes some of the reported pilot fatalities. Air India Captain Tarundeep Singh is one of them. He, according to the FIP, died of a heart attack on April 29 while on a scheduled layover and rest period in Bali after flying a Delhi-Denpasar flight. Capt. Arjun Naidu of Akasa Air died on April 30 after suffering a heart attack during a ground training session in Bengaluru, the federation said.

Air India Capt. Sunny Asladekar, who was “found dead in a Delhi hotel” on September 11 while undergoing Boeing 787 conversion training and during a layover period, was also cited by the FIP. Cardiac arrest was suspected but the cause of death was still under investigation, the letter stated.

However, the federation’s requests are much more than the investigation of individual deaths. Firstly, the FIP calls for immediate and uniform application of all approved FDTL provisions and for operator-specific dispensations to be withdrawn unless they can be justified on a safety-based basis as a temporary variation.

The FIP has said there has been “fragmentation” of the fatigue mitigation regime due to multiple “operator-specific variations” and delays in implementing some of the provisions. Temporary exemptions, it said, risk becoming prolonged operational practices and potentially undermining the objectives of fatigue management.

Second, the FIP wishes to see the regulator, airlines, pilot associations, medical specialists, sleep scientists and human-factors experts come together in a National FRMS Oversight Programme, which it wants the DGCA to create.

Third, the FIP would like to make it mandatory for airlines to provide DGCA with fatigue data every quarter. Those submissions would include fatigue reports received and rejected, corrective actions taken, FRMS performance indicators and operational occurrences involving fatigue. It also desires that the DGCA annually release anonymised industry-wide fatigue data so that fatigue trends in the Indian aviation industry can be tracked, instead of them being largely confined to individual airlines.

The fourth intervention is directly aimed at the concerns voiced by the recent deaths. The FIP would like to have an independent scientific review of pilot health trends from 2023 to 2026 (cardiovascular events, sudden incapacitation cases and duty cycle-related health occurrences). It has also sought a review of roster construction, standby utilisation, reserve duty allocation, ultra-long-range operations and exposure to circadian disruption.

Fifth, the FIP would like to see recognised pilot representative organisations (including itself) formally engaged in the deliberations of the future regarding FDTL, FRMS, pilot fatigue and aviation-safety policy. It has also recommended a national aviation-fatigue research programme in collaboration with medical institutions and aviation universities.

Several of these demands are accompanied by another question in the back of everyone’s mind: are pilots already reporting fatigue out of the gate? “Pilot fatigue remains significantly under-reported due to concerns regarding roster disruption, operational pressures and perceived career consequences,” the FIP letter stated.

It reported that existing reporting processes need greater transparency and stronger protection for reporting pilots and that existing oversight tends to be based on compliance to regulations, instead of “demonstrated fatigue-risk outcomes”.

The September letter is the latest of a series of representations made by the federation. On July 9, the FIP had requested that the DGCA remove the temporary extensions or variations to FDTL application. That letter mentioned “dispensations” had been granted to Air India and IndiGo in December 2025 and requested for their withdrawal.

The federation then sent a detailed submission on FRMS in August, referencing the Batik Air incident of January 2024, in which both pilots inadvertently fell asleep for approximately 28 minutes during a flight from Kendari to Jakarta before the crew recovered control of the aircraft.

The message was clear: “The crew met regulated duty-time limits, yet both pilots fell asleep. Fatigue management must focus on actual human performance, not merely hours on roster,” the FIP said.

That separation is at the heart of the FIP’s new campaign. FDTL rules dictate working and rest-time restrictions. The federation feels that the limits in themselves do not cover other factors, including consecutive duties, night flying, flying in the early morning hours, sleep opportunity and workload/circadian disruption.

“Fatigue rarely manifests as a single identifiable event,” the FIP said. “Rather, it develops cumulatively through repeated exposure to operational stressors, circadian disruption, inadequate recovery and organisational pressures.”