Indians, who are approved residents of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) by the Federal Authority for Identity and Citizenship (ICA), and are wanting to fly back to the UAE, will finally be able to do so.
India and the UAE have agreed to allow their airlines to carry eligible passengers on both legs of their charter flights between the two countries to be operated from July 12 to July 26, the Ministry of Civil Aviation said on Thursday.
Charter flights operated by UAE carriers will now be permitted to bring Indian citizens from the UAE to India and carry ‘ICA-approved UAE residents’ on their return leg, the ministry said.
In a statement issued, the Ministry of Civil Aviation on Thursday announced that all residents of UAE who want to head back from India will be able to do so on the Vande Bharat Mission flights, starting July 12 till July 26. Indian nationals will also be able to travel back on charter flights being operated from UAE to India.
“As part of the close strategic partnership between the governments of India and the UAE, and with a view to assisting UAE resident nationals who are at present in India to return to the UAE, the civil aviation authorities of both countries have agreed to operationalise the following arrangement from 12 July 2020,” the Civil Aviation Ministry said.
This has come as a major relief for stranded residents of UAE in India who were caught in an ongoing tussle between the civil aviation authorities of the two countries.
Air India Express CEO K Shyam Sundar also took to Twitter over the development and said: “Happy to announce Air India Express has opened its flights between 12th and 26th July from India to UAE for sale to Indians with UAE Resident Permits.”
Authorities in UAE earlier did not permit residents of the UAE to return from India on the Vande Bharat flights as they because they wanted India to allow airliners from UAE to be given permission to fly to and from India.
India is yet to resume commercial international passenger flights and has so far only been operating repatriation flights under the Vande Bharat Mission since May 7. Earlier, Air India and Air India Express operated all of the flights before private carriers like IndiGo and SpiceJet joined the mission.
