Flights between India and the United Kingdom, suspended since December 23 to verify the transmission of the most contagious new strain of the new coronavirus detected in that country, will resume on January 8, the government said Friday night.
There will only be 15 flights a week for the first two weeks, the government said.
Twenty-nine samples so far have tested positive for the British variant of SARS-CoV-2 in India, the Union Health Ministry said on Friday.
“It has been decided that flights between India and the UK will resume from January 8, 2021. Operations until January 23 will be restricted to 15 flights per week each for airlines from the two countries to and from Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Hyderabad only. The DGCA will publish the details shortly, ”Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri posted on Twitter.
The formal order announcing the resumption of flights will be issued late on Friday or early Saturday, a senior official from the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) said. The regulator was awaiting input from the health ministry on the guidelines to be issued to airports and airlines, the official said. Mandatory RT-PCR testing is likely to be a requirement for everyone arriving from the UK.
The flights were initially suspended until December 31, and then the suspension was extended until January 7. The 15 weekly flights that will be allowed between 8 and 23 January are less than a quarter of the more than 60 that connected airports in the United Kingdom, mainly London. – with Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Chennai, Bengaluru, Amritsar, Ahmedabad, Kochi, Goa, etc. every week before.
In addition to the UK, the new strain has been found in a number of countries, including the US, Canada, Singapore, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Japan, South Korea, and China. Flights between India and these countries continue to operate.
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