Keralite residents without ICA approval sent back

Our Correspondent

At least 127 Bangladeshis and 65 Indians stranded at the UAE airports flew back home on August 18, Khaleej Times reported quoting diplomats.

The newspaper had earlier reported the plight of passengers from Kerala on an Etihad flight. They had flown to the UAE after the National Emergency Crisis and Disaster Management Authority (NCEMA) said a pre-travel approval from the Federal Authority of Identity and Citizenship (ICA) was not required for residents to return.

The five passengers landed in Abu Dhabi on the Etihad Airways flight on August 15, and some 18 travellers in Sharjah airport on board Air Arabia two days later. said they were “not being allowed to enter the country”. The Abu Dhabi flight was from Kerala, while the other came from Lucknow.
The passengers and their travel agents said they were probably not allowed to exit the airports because they did not receive a green “OK to travel” status from the ICA when their documents were verified on the www.uaeentry.ica.gov.ae website.

Lasith Kayakkal, a furniture store employer whose two employees were stranded at Sharjah airport, said they had received a ‘red’ ICA notice that advised them to travel at a later date. But they had travelled on the assumption that they did not need pre-travel approvals. “My employees are needed back at work, and they had to travel long distances and spend hundreds on Covid-19 tests to come back,” he said.

Babu Parappurath, a firefighter with an Abu Dhabi government company, was one of the five Keralites held up at Abu Dhabi airport. He had travelled to India on March 9 and had got stranded there due to COVID-19 travel restrictions. Only one of the five was able to exit the airport and the rest had to fly back.

Neeraj Agarwal, Consul – Press, Information and Culture, said at least 43 Indians on an Indigo Airlines flight and 18 passengers on an Air Arabia one from Lucknow stranded in Sharjah airport have flown back.

According to Bangladesh Ambassador to the UAE, Mohammed Abu Zafar, of the 400 passengers who arrived on Air Arabia and Biman Airlines at the Abu Dhabi International Airport, 127 were not allowed to exit the airport and flew back in the last two days.