Phase VII of the Vande Bharat Mission (VBM) to repatriate Indians stranded abroad due to COVID-19 has commenced and 1,067 flights will be operated till October last.
This phase, announced on the basis of an assessment of the demand for seats from among NRIs and their families and the feedback from Indian missions, is an extended phase of VBM VI.
The 1,067 flights will be operated by Air India, its butget airline Air India Express and IndiGo. Air India Express alone has 496 flights and 197 of them are to the four international airports in Kerala. These airlines will also operate outbound flights, with Air India Express alone getting 448 flights.
Air India will operate flights from Sydney, Vancouver, Toronto, Hong Kong, Paris CDG, Frankfurt, Tel Aviv, Tokyo, Nairobi, Male, Yangon, Lagos, Washington DC, New York and London. Air India Express will concentrate on Bahrain, Kuwait, Malaysia, Singapore, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
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Airline sources said the inbound flights have a load factor of 80 to 85 per cent and NRI families were making use of them, especially from the Middle East countries. The delay in commencing services was leading to an increasing demand for seats in these flights.
However, the outbound flights of these airlines do not have much patronage. The demand is for seats to Dubai and Muscat and there is good movement of those getting fresh visas. The government is yet to give the nod to carry passengers to Saudi Arabia.
As many as 900 international flights were operated from 22 countries to 23 airports across India in VBM Phase V. In the 31-day phase that ended on September 30, 815 flights arrived with 1,17,685 passengers, while the 819 outbound ones from the key airports ferried 88,398.
