New Delhi: Passenger flights between the UK and India would remain suspended till January 7 and they will resume in a "strictly regulated" manner thereafter, Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri said on Wednesday.
The Civil Aviation Ministry had last week suspended all flights between the European country and India from December 23 to December 31 as a mutated variant of the coronavirus was detected there.
Puri said on Twitter: "Decision has been taken to extend the temporary suspension of flights to & from the UK till 7 January 2021."
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Decision has been taken to extend the temporary suspension of flights to & from the UK till 7 January 2021.
— Hardeep Singh Puri (@HardeepSPuri) December 30, 2020 " class="align-text-top noRightClick twitterSection" data="
Thereafter strictly regulated resumption will take place for which details will be announced shortly.
">Decision has been taken to extend the temporary suspension of flights to & from the UK till 7 January 2021.
— Hardeep Singh Puri (@HardeepSPuri) December 30, 2020
Thereafter strictly regulated resumption will take place for which details will be announced shortly.Decision has been taken to extend the temporary suspension of flights to & from the UK till 7 January 2021.
— Hardeep Singh Puri (@HardeepSPuri) December 30, 2020
Thereafter strictly regulated resumption will take place for which details will be announced shortly.
"Thereafter strictly regulated resumption will take place for which details will be announced shortly," he said.
According to the sources, a separate Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) will be laid out for passengers arriving from the UK in transit flights. "The passengers will have to go through mandatory RT-PCR test on arrival at the airports concerned, a source said adding that the isolation norms may also be changed for such passengers.
The development came after India reported 14 more positive cases for the variant of SARS- CoV-2 virus from UK here on Wednesday, taking the total number of positive cases for the new variant to 20 now.
From November 25 to midnight of December 23, 2020 about 33,000 passengers disembarked at various Indian airports from the UK.
India on 21 December ordered to impose a temporary suspension on flights coming from UK after the emergence of a new and highly infectious strain of the coronavirus in the UK.
Under the air bubble arrangement, India-UK have 67 weekly flights operated by Air India, Vistara, British Airways and Virgin Atlantic with around 2,000 passengers from Indian metros flying to London daily.
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