New teaching case co-authored by IIMB researchers examines trust, trade-offs and consumer response amid disruption

A new teaching case, ‘Flying on Uncertainty: IndiGo’s Operational Failures and Consumer Reactions’, co-authored by Prof. Abhishek Borah, INSEAD, and a team of IIMB Marketing area researchers comprising Shreya J, Academic Associate, and Neha Kaushik, Research Associate, and Dr. Gopal Das, has been published by INSEAD Publishing.

The case examines IndiGo’s December 2025 operational crisis, when widespread cancellations triggered by revised Flight Duty Time Limitation (FDTL) norms and compounded by weather, crew and system constraints, disrupted travel at peak season.

Moving past the immediate operational breakdown, the case examines what happens when reliability, which is central to a low-cost model, begins to fray.

It invites analysis of expectation violation, trust asymmetry, the efficiency–resilience trade-off and the resulting heightened sensitivity to competition in high-involvement, time-critical services.