TBM Staff - Mumbai Scheduled international flights, which have been suspended since the advent of the covid-19 pandemic in 2020, could resume by the end of the year, said Rajiv Bansal, Civil Aviation Secretary.
As things stand, scheduled international flights remain suspended at least till 30 November, according to a notification by civil aviation regulator the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) last month.
However, special flights, repatriation flights and flights under air bubble agreements are allowed to operate.
India currently has air bubble agreements with as many as 30 countries, which includes the likes of Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Canada, France, Germany, Iraq, Japan, Kenya, Nepal, Netherlands, Nigeria, Oman, Qatar, Sri Lanka, the UAE, the UK, and the US, among the others.
Civil aviation minister Jyotiraditya Scindia recently said that the government is keen to resume normal international travel operations and is evaluating the process.
“We are coming back to normalcy. First, we allowed 100% passenger capacity in our domestic flights and now we allowed in-flight meals in those flights,” Scindia said at the Confederation of Indian Industry’s (CII’s) Global Economy Policy Summit recently.
