But details of cost and schedule yet to be determined
Venkat Raman
Auckland, May 8, 2020
The Indian government is considering operating Air India flights to transport stranded Indians from New Zealand, High Commissioner Muktesh Pardeshi told a media conference today.
He said that while the schedule is yet to be finalised, the High Commission is currently gathering information about Indian nationals interested in utilising the facility.
The best source of updated information would be the High Commission’s Facebook page, which currently has notification regarding the Standard Operating Petrol (SAP).
The media conference was attended by Doss Jeyakumar (Head of Chancery) and Paramjeet Singh (Second Secretary) of the High Commission.
Mr Pardeshi said that that about 2200 people have thus far registered but not all of them may qualify or would want to return to India in the government-assisted flights.
Vande Bharat Mission
The flights, called, ‘Vande Bharat Mission,’ will be operated by Air India and its subsidiary Air India Express. According to the Press Information Bureau (PIB) a government agency, the two airlines will operate 64 flights to bring back more than 14,800 Indians stranded in 12 countries.
PIB said that 300 people will be coming back from the US, 250 each from the UK, Singapore, Malaysia and the Philippines, and 200 each from Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Riyadh, Doha and Dhaka.
Air India will operate the Delhi-Singapore flight from Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International airport, while Air India Express will operate Cochin-Abu Dhabi-Cochin and Kozhikode-Dubai-Kozhikode services.
“Besides one-way ferry service, Air India has invited passengers, who qualify under the government’s new international travel norms, to apply for passage from India to various destinations the airline will send its aircraft to conduct evacuation flights. Overall, more than 190,000 Indian nationals, who would have to pay a one-way ferry service charge, are expected to be brought back in the airlift operation,” the notification said.
Criteria for travel
Mr Pardeshi said that he was expecting further information about flights from New Zealand.
“These flights will be only for Indian nationals- those holding Indian passports. The selection criteria will include Indians who face deportation because of expiry of their visas, migrant workers who have lost their jobs, non-permanent residents from India whose visas have expired or about to expire, people needing medical treatment, elderly persons and pregnant women and those who had arrived in New Zealand as tourists,” he said.
Mr Pardeshi said that consideration will be given to those who wish to visit bereaved relatives and students who have completed their education courses, but these will not be on priority.
Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) cards have been temporarily suspended, and hence holders of these cards must obtain special visas to travel to India. These will be need-based visas, subject to fulfilment of other conditions and subject to availability of air services.
Quarantine in India
Mr Pardeshi said that all arriving passengers will be obliged to undergo a fourteen-day quarantine period at various district health centres or similar authorised locations.
They would be obliged to follow the regulations of the State governments at the destinations.
“We have not yet been informed of the cost per ticket but since the flights are operated by Air India, which is a government-owned company, it would be reasonable. We also await details of how and when these flights will be operated. There are a large number of Indians in countries such as United States of America, United Kingdom and other parts of Europe which have been severely impacted by Covid-19. They have to be transported on priority. New Zealand is a safe country,” he said.
India’s Mobile App
Mr Pardeshi encouraged all travellers to India to download the Mobile App developed by the Indian government on their smartphones.
Called, ‘Aarogya Setu’ (Health Bridge’), it is based on the GPS System developed by the National Informatics Centre and is free to install.
The government has clarified that only if a person is diagnosed as Covid-19 positive, the data is sent to the government servers in an encrypted form. The location and Bluetooth data of the person are pushed to the server with the objective of alerting those with whom the person had been in contact over the past 14 days,” a notification said.
