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Covid-19: UK to fly back its NRI citizens in 3 special flights from Amritsar
The flights will take off on April 13, 17 and 19 to London
The United Kingdom on Friday announced three special chartered flights from the Amritsar international airport to fly back its Indian-origin citizens stranded in Punjab and adjoining areas amid the ongoing lockdown imposed to contain the Covid-19 outbreak.
The flights will take off on April 13, 17 and 19 to London.
In a press release, the British High Commission spokesperson in New Delhi said, “Over 3,000 British travellers currently stranded in India will get home via 12 additional chartered flights (from other airports) which opened for booking today.”
Jan Thompson, acting high commissioner to India, said in the release, “We can confirm 12 more chartered flights to bring British travellers back home. Getting people home soon remains our absolute priority.”
UK minister of state for South Asia and the Commonwealth Lord Tariq Ahmad said, “We are doing all we can to get thousands of British travellers in India. This is a huge and complex operation which involves working with the Indian government to enable people to move in the country to get on these flights.”
The first chartered flight from India reached London on Thursday morning with 317 British nationals aboard from Goa.
Apart from Amritsar, the special flights will also leave from Ahmadabad (April 3, 15), Goa (April 14, 16), Goa (via Mumbai, April 18), Thiruvananthapuram (via Kochi, April 15), Hyderabad (via Ahmadabad, April 17), Kolkata (via Delhi, April 19), Chennai (via Bengaluru, April 20).
“A number of seats will be reserved for those deemed vulnerable. To book flights and register their details, British nationals should use the city-specific webpages listed on the ‘India travel advice’ page,” said the spokesperson.
On April 7, as many as 96 NRIs flew back to the US and around 200 to Canada through chartered flights, but still thousands of Canadians of Indian origin are stranded in Punjab due to high cost of these flights..
