4th phase of Vande Bharat from July 3

HT Correspondent

HT Correspondent

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New Delhi

India will launch the fourth phase of Vande Bharat Mission, the largest programme for repatriating stranded nationals, on July 3 after bringing back more than 360,000 nationals from around the world.

Vande Bharat Mission was launched in May to bring home hundreds of thousands of Indians stranded across the world because of Covid-19-related restrictions, including students, people facing medical emergencies and workers who had been laid off.

“In order to continue with our efforts, phase four of Vande Bharat Mission is being firmed up with effect from July 3 and will particularly focus on countries where we still have large numbers of Indians who have registered to return,” external affairs ministry spokesperson Anurag Srivastava told a weekly media briefing on Thursday.

Over the past seven weeks, a total of 513,047 Indians registered their request for repatriation with Indian missions abroad and 364,209 have returned as of Thursday.

A total of 875 international flights were scheduled from more than 50 countries in the first three phases of the mission, and more than 700 flights have reached India with 150,000 nationals.

“These flights have been instrumental in addressing the immediate requirements of stranded Indians in many parts of the world. We are committed to bringing back our remaining compatriots, particularly in the Gulf Cooperation Council countries, Malaysia, Singapore and other places,” Srivastava said.

Chartered flights under the mission began operating on May 26 and have increased over the past few weeks, he said. These flights have brought back 130,061 people, including seafarers and crews of shipping companies stranded in various places.

The government will streamline the process for charter flights as demand for them remains very high, especially in West Asia.

More than 84,000 Indians have also returned from Nepal, Bhutan and Bangladesh through land border immigration checkpoints. Naval ships are also bringing back people under the mission. INS Jalashwa reached Bandar Abbas port in Iran on June 24 to bring back a group of Indian citizens, Srivastava said.

However, flights by state-run Air India under the mission have run into problems as some countries have demanded that their countries too should be allowed to operate similar repatriation flights to India. The US has said flights under the mission will need to obtain permission 30 days in advance from July 22 as the Indian government has been engaging in “discriminatory” treatment of American airlines.