Our Correspondent
The Indian Consulate in Dubai has said that more than 2.75 lakh of the 5 lakh people who have registered to return to India have flown back on repatriation flights run by UAE and Indian carriers.
On August 2, the Consulate said in a tweet that for those people who are still stuck for difficulty in procuring tickets or lack of knowledge about the facilities, there are plenty of seats available on Air India and AI Express flights operating till August 15. While there are 90 more flights till end of Phase 5, more flights for the August 16-31 phase will be announced later, it informed.
As for those whose visit visas expired after March 1, 2020, they should leave the country before August 10 to avoid fines. CGI Dubai has offered to help those who need assistance if they write to the helpline window of the consulate with their passport, contact and destination details. If the desire date/sector is not available, they should be prepared to leave in the first available flight and to the nearest airport available but subject to State government rules.
The Ministry of Civil Aviation has advised travellers to a self-declaration form on the online portal of arriving airport or else to do it in duplicate in flight and hand over a copy of the same to Health & Immigration officials at arriving airport.
Meanwhile, in Oman the Vande Bharat Mission that started on May 9 has operated 105 flights to take home more than 18,000 Indian nationals, Gulf News reported quoting Anuj Swarup, Second Secretary, at the Indian Embassy in Oman. In addition to this, more than 38,000 Indian nationals travelled on 216 charter flights operated by various organisations. In Phase 5 of VBM, as many as 19 flights have been scheduled in the first half of August to various Indian states.
