This is a different question from a cancellation, and the answers really do diverge, so it is worth separating them. If your flight was cancelled outright, the compensation regime is set out in the answer on cancellations. What follows is about a flight that operated, operated late, and cost you the next one.
What the regulator gives you on a delay
The instrument is the Directorate General of Civil Aviation's Civil Aviation Requirement, Section 3 on Air Transport, Series M Part IV, titled facilities to be provided to passengers by airlines due to denied boarding, cancellation of flights and delays in flights. It was issued on 6 August 2010 and the current text runs to Revision 4 dated 25 January 2023. Read the delay provisions carefully, because they are about food and beds, not about money.
| Situation | What the requirement obliges the airline to do |
|---|---|
| Delay of 2 hours or more where the block time is up to two and a half hours, 3 hours where the block time is between two and a half and five hours, and 4 hours in any other case, provided you checked in on time | Meals and refreshments in relation to the waiting time, free of charge, under paragraph 3.8.1(a) |
| A domestic flight expected to be delayed more than 6 hours from the published or previously revised departure time | An option of either an alternate flight within six hours or a full refund of the ticket |
| Total delay more than 24 hours, or more than 6 hours for a flight scheduled to depart between 2000 and 0300 hours | Hotel accommodation when necessary, including transfers, under paragraph 3.8.1(b) |
| Delay caused by an extraordinary circumstance beyond the airline's control as defined in the requirement | The airline is relieved of the facilities obligation, but it has to establish the circumstance |
The distinction between delay and cancellation does not justify saying that a missed connection can never attract regulatory compensation. Paragraph 3.3.2 expressly addresses a missed connecting flight booked on the same ticket within the cancellation provisions. Read its conditions together with the extraordinary-circumstances exception and any applicable assistance or refund provisions.
The missed connection, which is where the money is
Were both flights on one booking, with a single reference and a through check in?
Yes: the airline carried the risk of its own delay. It undertook to get you to the final destination, its late departure defeated that undertaking, and rebooking you plus looking after you until it does is its problem, not yours. This is the strong case, and it is also a straightforward deficiency under Section 2(11).
Two separate tickets, bought independently, even from the same airline: the contract on the first ticket ended at the intermediate airport. The airline can say, with some force, that it never promised to deliver you to a connection it did not sell you. A delay is not automatically actionable deficiency in every circumstance. Liability for the missed second ticket depends on the contractual undertaking, the cause of delay and the loss that can properly be attributed to the first carrier.
Two tickets sold as a package by a travel agent or an online platform: the seller is in the frame as well. If the platform sold the itinerary as a connection, it held out the connection, and it is a proper opposite party alongside the airline.
The consumer route
Section 2(42) names transport in the definition of service. A delay that breaks a journey the airline undertook to perform is deficiency under Section 2(11), and Section 39(1) allows the return of the charges paid with interest, compensation for loss or injury suffered due to negligence, punitive damages under the proviso where the conduct deserves it, and adequate costs. Section 100 keeps this alive alongside the regulator, and the requirement itself says as much: after complaining to the airline and using the Air Sewa portal, the passenger has liberty to complain to any statutory body or court set up under the applicable laws. For an international journey there is a further layer under the Carriage by Air Act, 1972, and that is worth separate advice rather than a general answer.
What to gather, and gather it at the airport
- Both boarding passes and both booking references, which together prove whether it was one contract or two
- Every message from the airline about the delay, with its timestamp, because the burden about notification sits on the airline
- A photograph of the departure board showing the revised time, taken with the phone's date on
- Receipts for everything the delay cost: the rebooked ticket, the hotel, the airport taxi, the meals the airline did not provide
- The written reason the airline gives for the delay, asked for in writing at the counter and again by email
- The Air Sewa complaint reference and the airline's reply or silence
The commonest reason these complaints fail is the two ticket problem, and it is decided long before the delay, at the moment of booking. A cheaper self connected itinerary saves a few thousand rupees and moves the entire risk of a delay onto the passenger. When someone asks me whether it is worth it, my answer is that it is a choice about who carries the risk, and it is fine to carry it as long as you know you have taken it. Our note on passenger rights for delays and cancellations sets out the wider framework, and if the claim is small, remember that Section 34(2)(d) lets you file where you live.