India-Bangladesh air bubble flights to resume from today

Flight services between the two countries were suspended four months ago due to the second wave of Kovid-19.

Earlier, India’s Civil Aviation Ministry had said last week that flight services would be restored till the resumption of international passenger flights from September 3.

Rajiv Jain, Additional Director General (Media and Communications) and spokesperson of the Ministry of Civil Aviation confirmed that flights will resume from September 3.

Domestic carriers – SpiceJet, Indigo and Air India – will operate flights to Dhaka.

The agreement with Bangladesh, which came into effect from October 28, 2020, was valid till March 27, 2021, allowing Indian and Bangladeshi carriers to operate services between the two countries.

Scheduled international passenger flights to India have been suspended since March last year, with India entering into an air bubble arrangement with various countries, including Bangladesh, for operational flights.

Under an air bubble arrangement between two countries, international passenger flights may be operated by their respective carriers into each other’s territories, subject to certain conditions. Scheduled international passenger services have been suspended in India with effect from March 23, 2020, due to the coronavirus pandemic.

India has air-bubble agreements with around 28 countries including the US, UK, UAE, Kenya, Bhutan and France.

Meanwhile, in a letter to all States and Union Territories (UTs), the government said that the reports of new mutations in SARS-CoV-2 and Variant of Concern (VOCs) and Variant of Interest (Vols) globally. Considering the rising number, seven countries have been added to the list of countries whose passengers will have to undergo another RT-PCR test upon landing at Indian airports, apart from getting them to undergo another RT-PCR test before taking off. Will happen.

These seven countries are South Africa, Bangladesh, Botswana, China, Mauritius, New Zealand and Zimbabwe.