The Ministry of Civil Aviation has issued a show-cause notice to Air India after three Italian nationals flew from Delhi to Munich without completing the mandatory immigration process, exposing serious gaps in the airline’s passenger-handling procedures at the airport.
The passengers had arrived in Delhi from Amritsar on Air India flight AI-1115 at around 12.50 am on September 4. Roughly an hour later, at about 1.45 am, they boarded Lufthansa flight LH-763 to Munich without passing through immigration.
The ministry has described the incident as a serious security and immigration-related lapse and has given Air India seven days to explain why action should not be taken against it for violating the approved Standard Operating Procedure governing hub-and-spoke operations.
How the passengers entered the international departure route
The incident involved Air India’s hub-and-spoke system, under which passengers from smaller airports can connect to international flights through a major hub such as Delhi.
Air India’s programme, also referred to as “Easy Connect”, allows eligible passengers travelling overseas through Delhi to complete check-in and immigration at their originating domestic airport. Such passengers can then proceed directly to the international departure gate after landing in Delhi. Their boarding passes carry the “I” designator, allowing authorities and airline staff to distinguish them from ordinary domestic passengers.
However, the three Italian nationals were reportedly not eligible to use that process for their journey to Munich. They were travelling from Amritsar to Delhi before taking a Lufthansa international flight and should therefore have exited the domestic arrival flow at Delhi and completed the required immigration formalities.
At Amritsar, they were issued “D” or domestic boarding passes for the Air India sector. They were also given boarding passes for their onward Lufthansa flight to Munich.
According to the ministry’s notice, Air India’s approved procedure provides for two categories of boarding passes, “D” for domestic passengers and “I” for international passengers. The ministry has questioned the process by which the additional boarding passes were issued to the passengers at Amritsar.
After arriving in Delhi, the three passengers were allegedly taken from Gate 39 to the International-to-International Transfer Area instead of being directed towards the domestic arrivals area and immigration.
They subsequently reached the international departure area and boarded the Lufthansa flight without undergoing the mandatory immigration check.
Five areas of Air India’s SOP under scrutiny
The ministry has identified five provisions of Air India’s Domestic-International Operations SOP that it believes were not followed.
The first concerns the boarding-pass system. The prescribed process provides for “D” and “I” categories, with the designator indicating how a passenger must be handled at the hub airport.
The second provision requires domestic and international passengers to be segregated after disembarkation. The ministry has said the three passengers were not separated from the appropriate passenger flow after arriving in Delhi.
The third provision states that access to the International-to-International Transfer Desk should be restricted to passengers holding “I”-category boarding passes. The ministry has therefore questioned how passengers holding “D” boarding passes were allowed to enter the international transfer area.
The other two provisions relate to the round-the-clock deployment of a nodal officer and monitoring team at both hub and spoke airports.
Their responsibilities include ensuring that passengers follow the correct route, preventing them from entering the international departure process without completing the necessary formalities and carrying out the required reconciliation of domestic and international passengers.
The ministry has concluded that the monitoring mechanism failed to prevent the three passengers from being wrongly channelled into the international transfer system.
Ministry seeks answers on staff, passenger data and checks
The show-cause notice has sought a detailed explanation from Air India on how passengers holding “D” boarding passes were allowed to reach the international transfer area.
The airline has also been asked to explain why the three passengers were not segregated from the domestic passenger flow after their arrival in Delhi and why they were issued boarding passes for their onward Lufthansa journey at Amritsar.
The ministry has sought details of the role played by Air India personnel and SATS staff involved in handling and transferring the passengers. Other reporting has identified the ground-handling agency as AISATS and said the ministry has sought details about its role in the transfer process.
Questions have also been raised about the designated nodal officer and monitoring team. The ministry wants to know whether the officials were present at the relevant time, what action they took and why the required reconciliation of domestic and international passengers was not completed promptly.
The ministry has further sought information on whether the General Declaration, passenger manifest and API-PNR data relating to the passengers were shared with immigration authorities in time, and whether their status was correctly reflected in those records.
At the heart of the inquiry is a basic question: how did three passengers recorded as domestic travellers manage to enter the international departure process and leave India without triggering the mandatory immigration checks?
Manual reconciliation exposed the lapse
The discrepancy was not detected before the passengers boarded their international flight.
Instead, the lapse came to light later during manual reconciliation of passenger data. The ministry is therefore examining not just the actions of individual employees but also whether Air India’s systems and supervisory checks were capable of detecting a passenger moving from the domestic arrival stream to an international departure without immigration clearance.
The episode has raised particular concerns because the hub-and-spoke model depends on clearly identifying passengers who have already completed immigration at their originating airport and distinguishing them from those who must complete immigration at the hub.
A failure in that distinction can allow passengers who should leave the domestic arrival route to be mistakenly treated as international transfer passengers.
Air India and Lufthansa have a codeshare relationship
The onward journey involved Lufthansa flight LH-763, and Air India and Lufthansa have a codeshare partnership under which passengers can book connecting journeys involving both airlines on a single itinerary.
The two airlines have maintained a codeshare relationship since 2004, with the partnership expanded in February 2025.
The fact that the passengers had onward Lufthansa boarding passes issued at Amritsar is one of the issues the civil aviation ministry has specifically sought an explanation for.
What the hub-and-spoke system is supposed to do
The hub-and-spoke model is designed to make domestic-to-international connections easier by linking passengers from smaller airports to international services operating from major hubs.
Air India launched its hub-and-spoke programme with government backing a few months ago. The service is currently available from airports including Amritsar, Varanasi and Ahmedabad, with more airports expected to be added.
Under the intended process, eligible passengers can complete check-in and immigration at their originating airport before travelling to Delhi. Their baggage can also be checked through to their overseas destination, allowing them to avoid repeating the immigration process at the hub.
Passengers who have not completed immigration at the originating airport, however, must be correctly identified at Delhi and directed through the prescribed immigration route before departing India.
The three Italian nationals appear to have been incorrectly handled as international transfer passengers despite being required to complete immigration at Delhi.
Air India given seven days to respond
The Ministry of Civil Aviation issued the show-cause notice on September 12 and has given Air India seven days from receipt of the notice to submit its response along with the relevant documents and information.
The ministry has warned that if the airline does not respond within the stipulated period, it could be treated as having no explanation to offer. The matter could then be processed on the basis of the records already available, with administrative and regulatory action considered against the airline.
Air India had not issued a public response to the notice at the time of the latest reports.
Delhi International Airport Limited, the airport operator, said it had not received a show-cause notice in connection with the matter. DIAL said security at Indira Gandhi International Airport is managed under a multi-agency framework and that it remains committed to supporting the relevant security and government agencies and complying with laid-down protocols.
The incident has consequently put the spotlight on the safeguards surrounding Air India’s hub-and-spoke operations and on the coordination between the airline, ground-handling personnel and other agencies responsible for ensuring that passengers do not bypass mandatory immigration procedures.