(CNN) – Priyam Saini and Anuj Dhir were living in several Australian cities when they met on an Indian matrimonial matchmaking site in June last year.
By February, they were married.
“I think when things are meant to be, they just happen fast,” says Dhir, a civil engineer.
A small official service was held in New Delhi, for the couple’s families, and Dhir went away later to start a new job. Saini, a psychologist, had plans to move out of Brisbane to live with him in Sydney.
Five months later she is still in New Delhi.
“We had so many plans, and now we’re just waiting to see each other,” Saini says.
The pair has been separated by coronavirus rules in two countries. And they are not alone.
Of 18,800 Australian citizens and visa holders abroad who have told the government they want to return, 7,500 are in India.
In recent months, diplomats have helped 8,000 people board 45 flights from India to Australia, according to a spokesman for Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT).
But some of the thousands of Australian citizens and visa holders still there say not enough is being done to help them get home. They are angry, frustrated, and some have money on them.
They accuse Australia of imposing borders on international arrivals, which have halved the number of citizens and residents who can return home each week.
And they point to the government’s decision to return 300 international students to Australia next month as proof that the country’s leaders have turned their backs on their own people.
Edges closed
Priyam and Anuj met online in June and by February they were married. They plan to live together in Sydney to build a new life for a couple.
“We also strongly urge Australians to return home to do this as soon as possible,” Prime Minister Scott Morrison said at the time. Those who could not, or chose not to return, were advised to listen to local authorities.
The first wave of Australian coronavirus cases peaked in late March and March, and for a few months it seems that the country has managed to suppress the transmission of the community. But in early July, cases began to increase again and the government cracked down on international arrivals.
No international flights may land in Melbourne, the epicenter of the second wave. Airlines place returning citizens and residents on later flights or cancel them altogether to comply with the rules.
The government says the limits are necessary to reduce the pressure on the hotel quarantine system. All incoming travelers are required to guarantee 14 days in hotels.
Although hotel quarantine has been shown to work well in some cities, it has been blamed for the recent rise in cases in the state of Victoria, prompting officials to re-use a lockdown.
Nearly 99% of Victoria’s second-wave cases have been linked to two quarantine hotels in Melbourne, the state capital, officials said in response to a question about the outbreak.
Australians in India say they are being made to suffer for the failures of one state’s quarantine system – and say that success in other cities shows that the risks can be managed.
“People who make mistakes in the country cost people like us,” says Sameer Raichandani, who returned to India in June to visit his father because he was undergoing chemotherapy for leukemia.
He hopes to return to Sydney in early November for the birth of his second child, but is slowly losing hope.
Empty houses
Vinod Nagaraja and Sangeeta Kumar had just enough time to move boxes in their new home in Sydney in February before arriving the next day on a flight to India to spend time with Kumar’s dying mother.
They planned to return on March 26, after the funeral, but their flight was canceled because India went into a strict lockdown that lasted until June. They have since tried to book flights from Kochi, in the state of Kerala, and have suitcases on standby when seats suddenly appear.
“Within a moment of the report, we can leave, but the problem is just not getting tickets,” Kumar says.
Vinod Nagaraja and Sangeeta Kumar bought their first home in Sydney before traveling to India to see Kumar’s sick mother. They plan to return in March. Their new home has been empty for months now.
Hoflikens Vinod Sangeeta
Saini, the newlyweds, has spent days in front of her laptop, waiting for the cards to go online. When nothing appeared, she went to the Air India office in New Delhi to ask what happened.
“I cried and cried just because I knew tickets were already sold out, and we had no flights until October,” she says.
Air India said tickets for the two flights went to passengers who were buried from previous flights – and even then numbers were limited.
“The flights can only carry a maximum of 45 passengers due to restrictions placed by Australian authorities,” an Air India spokesman said.
Just in August four flights from New Delhi to Australia were scheduled in August, for a total of about 400 to carry people, according to the High Commission of Australia in India and Air India.
DFAT says it is continuing to ‘explore options’ for Australians to go on commercial flights.
“There are currently no plans for Australian government-facilitated flights from India,” a spokesman said.
Families split
Mehul Patel’s wife Vibha and daughter Aarya are stranded in Rajkot, Gujarat. Patel has not seen her in person since February and on Friday he missed his daughter’s first birthday.
Courtesy Mehul Patel
Some are so desperate to get home that they investigate charter flights.
Mehul Patel is trying to buy tickets for his wife and daughter who are stranded in Rajkot, Gujarat. He has not seen them since February, when he took an earlier flight to Melbourne. He missed his daughter’s first birthday on Friday and wants his family back.
Charter flights must have permission from the Australian Border Force to land – and at present no one has been approved, says Patel.
The government insists there would be no special charter flights.
However, Australians who are stranded in India are afraid that foreign students will take seats that might otherwise have been assigned to them.
Bryce Onions, an Australian taxi driver who spends time at a two-star hotel near the airport in New Delhi, says the government needs to do more to help Australians get stuck abroad.
“They’re not doing enough, nowhere near enough – it’s bad, it’s disgusting,” he says.
Onions left Australia before Christmas to spend time with friends in Darjeeling, West Bengal, and planned to spend time in Egypt and Botswana before returning. Those tours have been canceled.
“They say, you know, to come home. After everything failed for me, I thought I would go home, but then I could not.”
Dwindling funds
Robert Lepcha, his wife and daughter stay with extended family in Sikkim, India. He worries about traveling to New Delhi – a hotspot for Covid cases – if they manage to find a flight.
Courtesy Robert Lepcha
Some Australians living abroad are worried they will run out of money.
Robert Lepcha, his wife and their two year old daughter are stranded in Sikkim, in northeastern India. The trio had planned to return to Australia in the new year, after visiting extended family.
Before leaving, Lepcha worked as a security guard at a taxi rank in the upmarket coastal town of Byron Bay, in New South Wales. Well, there is no job to go home – even if he could find a flight.
“Right now I’m basically trying to borrow money from friends and family in Australia. All my savings are gone.”
Even if he could find a flight from New Delhi, Lepcha is afraid for his wife and children to the Indian capital, a four-hour flight away.
“Delhi is a hotspot. I’m afraid to get Covid-19 myself,” he says.
On Friday, the Australian Prime Minister said the government was exploring ways to provide more assistance to Australians stranded abroad. Until then, for many, there is no other option but to wait.
The money Saini and Dhir have saved for their honeymoon is set aside for flight costs – if and when they can find one – and the cost of quarantine of $ 3,000 ($ 2,150).
Their relationship may have started as an online romance between two cities, but the separation between two countries is “so much harder,” Dhir says.
“Then, even though we were in a long distance relationship, we had something to look forward to … Not knowing what the future holds, it’s really hard to go on.”
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