Vande Bharat Mission-II: Weeklong ops to begin on May 16149 flights to bring back Indians from 31 countries

Tribune News Service

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New Delhi, May 13

In the second phase of the Vande Bharat Mission to repatriate stranded Indians abroad, Air India plans to operate 149 repatriation flights to 31 countries between May 16 and 22. Of these, seven will reach Amritsar, Punjab, two will land in Chandigarh, and 22 in Delhi.

A senior official in Air India said they had worked out a plan in this regard. The national carrier had originally planned the week-long second phase as a back-to-back operation after the first phase was to end on May 14. But the exercise required some logistic, so it has been pushed further by a couple of days to May 16.

During the first phase of the Vande Bharat Mission, Air India and its subsidiary Air India Express are scheduled to operate 64 flights between May 7 and 14 to bring over 15,000 Indians from 12 countries on a payment basis.

As the flights will also come from the US, Canada, Australia, Ukraine and the UK, where Punjabi expats are in a good number, it has been planned that seven flights to Amritsar and two to Chandigarh would be operated, a senior AI official said. Besides, the Delhi airport would see 22 flights landing.

The second phase of the mission would also see flights from the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Oman, Kazakhstan, Qatar, Indonesia, Russia, Philippines, France, Singapore and Ireland among others.