Picture the departure hall at Delhi airport this weekend. The board still shows the Gulf flights, but the ones to Riyadh and Jeddah are not going anywhere, and the families standing under them are doing the maths nobody wants to do: rebook, refund, or wait. For thousands of Indian travellers, that wait just got longer. Air India, IndiGo and Akasa Air have all stretched their Saudi flight cancellations deeper into November, and the new dates do not line up neatly. Your return date now depends less on your destination and more on which airline you booked.
A weekend of extensions, in order
This did not happen in one announcement. It unfolded across Friday and Saturday, which is part of why it has confused passengers.
On Friday, Akasa Air moved first, extending its suspension of Riyadh services to November 30 and Jeddah services to November 10, according to the airline’s announcement reported by PTI. IndiGo, also on Friday, cancelled Riyadh flights till October 31, with Jeddah, Dammam and Madinah cancelled till October 27.
On Saturday, Air India and Air India Express extended their suspension of flights to and from Riyadh and Dammam until November 7, while Jeddah services stay suspended until October 31, the airline said in a post on X, as reported by PTI. The two airlines had earlier cancelled their Saudi services till October 24, so this is the second time the date has moved. IndiGo followed on Saturday too, extending its Jeddah, Dammam and Madinah cancellations to October 31 after what it called a careful assessment.
Read those dates side by side and the picture gets odd. Fly Akasa to Riyadh and you are grounded till the end of November. Fly IndiGo to the same city and the current cutoff is October 31. Same sky, same region, a month apart. That gap is the single most useful thing to know if you hold a ticket right now: check your airline’s notice, not just your destination.
Why the airlines are not flying
The airlines are pointing to the same reason: the prevailing situation in the region. Behind that careful phrase sits a week of security incidents around Saudi airports, with escalating geopolitical tensions in the Gulf, as PTI reported. Saudi authorities issued alerts over a potential aerial threat in several areas, including Mecca, Jeddah, Yanbu and Taif, and later confirmed the danger had passed, according to ANI. The Saudi-led coalition also said air defences intercepted two ballistic missiles aimed at Taif and Yanbu, ANI reported.
Airlines do not ground profitable routes lightly, and four carriers moving within 24 hours tells you this was not one airline being cautious. It was the whole market reading the same risk the same way. The staggered return dates, though, suggest they are not reading the recovery the same way. IndiGo is betting on a short disruption. Akasa is pricing in a long one. Air India sits in the middle.
What passengers can actually do
For Air India and Air India Express passengers, the practical offer is clear. Those holding confirmed bookings issued on or before October 24 can take flexible rebooking or a full refund on cancellation, the airline said. If your ticket was issued after that date, contact the airline directly, because the published waiver does not cover you in the same terms.
The human side of this is the pilgrim traffic. Indian diplomatic missions have stepped up assistance for affected passengers, including Umrah pilgrims facing delayed departures and accommodation problems, according to The Economic Times. The Consulate General of India in Jeddah activated round-the-clock control rooms in Jeddah and Makkah, and is coordinating with Saudi authorities on visa extensions and delayed departures, as well as arranging food, medicines and other immediate relief, PTI reported. Pilgrims facing accommodation or service issues were advised to contact the Saudi Ministry of Hajj and Umrah’s Pilgrim Care Centre at 1966 within Saudi Arabia and share their case reference numbers with the consular control rooms for follow-up.
That 1966 number is worth saving before you travel, not after you land in a problem. Consular help works best when the passenger arrives with a booking reference, a case number and a clear account of what went wrong. It works worst when the first call comes from an airport floor at midnight.
It is also worth remembering that Indian travellers are absorbing disruption on two fronts at once. A Bay of Bengal storm is bearing down on the Odisha-Andhra coast this week, and the contrast with the new Leh airport terminal inaugurated days ago could hardly be sharper: one week India opens airport capacity, the next week its airlines cannot use some of the sky they already had.
The question now is whether November 7 holds, or whether it moves again the way October 24 did. If you are booked to Saudi Arabia in the next month, do not wait for the airline to find you. Check the notice today, decide between rebooking and refund while both options are open, and keep the consulate’s number where you can reach it. The sky will reopen. The only question is which airline’s calendar you are living on until it does.