DGCA Issues Urgent Advisory Ordering Indian Airlines To Avoid 11 Conflict-Zone Airspaces In West Asia

India’s Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) late on 20 March 2026 issued an extraordinary safety advisory instructing all Indian airlines to steer clear of 11 identified West-Asian Flight Information Regions (FIRs) covering Iran, Israel, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, the Palestinian Territories (Gaza FIR), Yemen, parts of Saudi Arabia, the Red Sea FIR and the entire Strait of Hormuz corridor. The step came hours after a fresh round of US-Israel strikes on Iranian Revolutionary Guard facilities triggered a volley of retaliatory missile attacks that temporarily closed Ben-Gurion International Airport and caused at least two near-miss incidents involving over-flying cargo aircraft. Although India has traditionally relied on these routings for the shortest great-circle tracks to Europe and North America, the regulator said the "rapidly deteriorating conflict-zone risk profile" now warranted an immediate reroute of all scheduled, charter and freighter operations. In its advisory, the DGCA asked carriers to submit revised flight plans within 12 hours, to monitor NOTAMs in real time and to activate contingency fuel planning for detours of up to 650 nautical miles. Airlines have also been told to keep 24×7 crisis-management teams on standby, maintain satellite-phone contact with dispatchers, and brief crew about diversion alternates in the Caucasus, Central Asia and Africa. Operationally, Air India and IndiGo will be the most affected: both airlines operate 193 weekly departures to Europe and 78 to North America that normally traverse Iranian or Iraqi airspace. Initial industry modelling by consulting firm Osprey Flight Solutions indicates average block-time increases of 35–70 minutes and additional fuel burn of 1.3–1.9 tonnes per sector, potentially adding ₹12–18 crore (US $1.4–2.1 million) in monthly costs for the two largest carriers alone. Cargo operators such as Blue Dart and SpiceXpress will need to re-file trans-Gulf sectors through Muscat FIR and Sudanese airspace, raising payload-range penalties at the height of India’s mango-export season. For corporate mobility managers the advice is clear: build extra connection time into itineraries, warn executives about likely mid-route fuel stops (Vienna, Baku and Addis Ababa are emerging as popular tech-stops), and re-check travel-insurance clauses for ‘war-risk’ exclusions.



As many travellers now face potential diversions through unfamiliar airports, rapid visa facilitation becomes crucial. VisaHQ’s India portal (https://www.visahq.com/india/) lets passengers and corporate travel teams instantly confirm transit-visa requirements for more than 200 countries and secure the necessary documents online within hours, ensuring that an unscheduled stop in Addis Ababa, Baku or Vienna doesn’t turn into an immigration snag.

Immigration schedules are also being disrupted, with several Delhi-bound flights from London and Frankfurt already announcing revised ETAs of +90 minutes. The DGCA said it will review the situation every 48 hours in consultation with EASA’s Conflict Zone Information Bulletin and the ICAO Threat & Risk Working Group.