Scheduled international passenger flights to remain suspended till September 30 in India, except those operating under bilateral bubbles. By Tanvi Jain
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The current ban on scheduled international flights has been extended till September 30, barring those operating under bilateral bubble arrangement with select nations. The Directorate General of Civil aviation (DGCA) released a statement, further mentioning that “the restriction shall not apply to international all-cargo operations and flights specially approved by DGCA. However, international scheduled flights may be allowed on selected routes by the competent authority on a case-to-case basis.”
While the scheduled international passenger flights have remained suspended since March 23, 2020, amid the COVID-19 outbreak, national carrier Air India has been operating special repatriation flights since May to bring back Indian nationals stranded abroad and to also ferry foreign nationals stuck in India, back to their homelands.
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Moreover, India is also operating flights on select routes as a part of the recently created bilateral bubbles with seven countries, namely, the United States, the United Kingdom, UAE, Germany France, Maldives and Qatar. It is now in talks with countries such as Italy, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Bahrain, Nigeria, Kenya, Israel, Russia, Philippines, South Korea, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Nepal, for a similar arrangement.
The current ongoing ban on scheduled international commercial flights which was earlier announced till August 31 has been extended till September 30, because the government had earlier stated that the relaxations on international flights will depend on the Coronavirus situation in the country.
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“I cannot anticipate whether countries will allow people from India in, but we have gone ahead and made the best out of a very difficult situation, navigated through turbulence, and today we have air bubbles with the US, Canada, the UK, France, Germany. I have announced 13 more,” Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri told Indian Express.
“India’s Civil Aviation sector continues on a steady growth trajectory. More than 7 million passengers on 77,547 flights in 100 days since the recommencement of domestic flights on 25 May 2020,” he confirmed in a tweet.
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