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Passenger trains and flights to remain suspended till May 3
The government has allowed the movement of both cargo flights and freight trains during the lockdown period in a bid to keep supplies of essential commodities running.
New Delhi: Passenger trains, and domestic and international flights will not operate in India till May 3, following Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s announcement that the three-week long national lockdown that ended Tuesday midnight will be extended by another 19 days.
The government has allowed the movement of both cargo flights and freight trains during the lockdown period in a bid to keep supplies of essential commodities running.
“There were good reasons for the lockdown to be extended till May 3. We can consider lifting restrictions on both domestic and international flights thereafter. I understand the problems being faced by people who need to travel and request them to bear with us,” union civil aviation minister Hardeep Puri said.
Metro rail services too will remain suspended till May 3, the government announced.
“In continuation of the measures taken in the wake of Covid-19 lockdown, it has been decided that all passenger train services on Indian Railways including premium trains, mail/express trains, passenger trains, suburban trains, Kolkata Metro Rail, Konkan Railway etc shall continue to remain cancelled till the 2400hrs of May 3, 2020. To ensure the essential supplies in various parts of the country, movement of goods and parcel trains will remain continue,” the ministry of railways said Tuesday.
Air cargo services will also continue.
With Indian Railways taking bookings from April 15, it is now staring at the prospect of refunding 3.9 million tickets booked for journeys during this period. It wasn’t immediately clear why it did so.
Perhaps in an attempt to avoid a repeat, Indian Railways has now also cancelled advance ticket bookings. “No booking of any type of tickets, including E tickets shall be done till further advice. However, facility of online cancellation will remain functional for ticket bookings. Full refund will be given for tickets for the bookings made for the trains cancelled. Full refund will also be there for those cancelling the advance bookings of tickets for trains not yet cancelled,” the ministry added.
HT reported on April 11 that the suspension of commercial flights and railway travel may be extended till the end of the month.
“All domestic and international scheduled airlines’ operations shall remain suspended till 11.59pm of 3rd May 2020,” the civil aviation ministry said. India is also not allowing flights to rescue stranded Indian citizens abroad.
While both the civil aviation ministry and the railway ministry have prepared plans on enabling movement once the travel restrictions are lifted, officials aware of the developments had said the government is likely to resume transport only after reviewing the number of cases after 15 days. Speaking at an industry seminar, former chairman of the railway board and Air India Ashwani Lohani said, “Airlines will have to relook at their ticket pricing model as social distancing will make it harder to generate revenue.”
Once restrictions are lifted, the national carrier is planning to ensure strict social distancing norms in trains, which includes mandatory thermal screening and no allotment of the middle berth in the sleeper class.
Airlines have also prepared a plan for probable opening of commercial flight operations once the lockdown is lifted.
Reporting time for passengers to the airport should be increased up to 120 minutes, so that passengers may smoothly pass through all the channels like access control, random screening, check-in, immigration (in case of international passengers) by maintaining appropriate distance, according to the plan.
