Guwahati: The Government has decided to extend the suspension of international flights from India till September 30 due to the surging COVID-19 crisis. This ban, however, will not apply to international all-cargo and international scheduled flights approved by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA).
"In partial modification of circular dated 26-08-2020, the competent authority has further extended the validity of circular issued on the subject cited above regarding Scheduled International commercial passenger services to/from India till 2359 hrs 1ST of 30 September, 2020. This restriction shall not apply to international all-cargo operations and flights specifically approved by DGCA. International Scheduled flights may be allowed on selected routes by the competent authority on case to case bags," DGCA stated in the order.
DGCA Chief Arun Kumar on August 9 stated that full-fledged resumption of international flight operations would depend on the state of pandemic all over the world. However, India's prognosis does not appear too bright as it recently became the worst-affected in the world in terms of the discovery of new Covid-19 cases on a daily basis. Experts have opined that the country is yet to hit its COVID-19 peak. India is currently clocking around 75,000 COVID-19 cases on a regular basis.
Kumar had recently confessed to media that since a lot of countries are still enforcing quarantine measures, it will take some time to have fully operative international flights.
In its efforts to commence air connectivity, India has established air bubbles with the USA, UK, France, Germany, UAE, Qatar, and Maldives; the Indian government is in the process of establishing such arrangements with 13 more countries. The movement of scheduled international flights via air bubbles is being allowed. Once this comes through, it will allow India to expand the operations of its 'Vande Bharat' repatriation scheme to ferry out stranded Indians in foreign countries.
The government banned international and domestic flights in March with the announcement of the lockdown and extended the ban on international travel till August 31. Domestic flight operations were allowed to resume on May 25.
An air bubble is a travel corridor between two countries which will fly their aircraft in a regulated environment.