Aviation minister appreciates resumption of scheduled overseas flights

New Delhi: Union Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia said that the resumption of scheduled international flights in India on Sunday would help India connect with the world. The resumption of services was after two years of pandemic-hit slump, The Indian Express.

The Directorate General of Civil Aviation informed that six Indian airlines and 60 foreign will start services connecting India with 63 countries from Sunday. As per the summer schedule, Indian carriers will operate 1,466 departures in a week. IndiGo leads 505 departures, and Tata Group's Air India will use 361. Tata Group's subsidiary Air India Express will run 340 flights in the summer schedule, which is between March 27 and October 29.

Before the pandemic breakout, the last schedule listed 4,700 international departures every week from Indian airports. The split between Indian and foreign departures were approximately 50:50.

Up to Saturday, India was operating flights in 37 countries with air bubble arrangements.

Recently, the Ministry of Civil Aviation had released the updated guidelines for international travel. Flight cabin crew need not necessarily wear PPE kits, flights need not keep three seats vacant for medical emergencies etc. But wearing face masks as well as maintaining social distance remains mandatory.

The ministry said that airlines could carry a few additional PPE kits, sanitiser and N-95 masks in case of respiratory infection-related cases arise.

The suspension on scheduled flights was imposed in March 2020, which ran for two years, was imposed after the pandemic outbreak. Only a few international flights were operated under pandemic bubble arrangements.

On March 8, the civil aviation ministry announced that regular overseas flights would resume from March 27 amid a decline in Covid-19 cases.

On March 8, 2022, the aviation ministry had announced the resumption of scheduled international flights from March 27. The countries to be connected after the new development will include Iran, Malaysia, South Korea, Poland, Myanmar, Turkey, Yemen and Egypt.