Coronavirus scare: Centre issues travel advisory, international travellers to show health certificates

NEW DELHI: Foreign airlines are likely to significantly reduce flights to India, through a mix of cancellations and frequency reductions on different routes, with India suspending most existing visas till April 15, 2020.Visa suspension, which comes into effect from 5.30pm on Friday (March 13) at ports of departure abroad, exempts diplomatic, official, UN/international organisations, employment and project-visa holders. Visa-free facility granted to overseas citizens of India (OCI) card-holders is kept in abeyance till April 15, 2020.Demand for travel out of India will also reduce as the health ministry, after a group of ministers' meeting on Wednesday to contain the spread of coronavirus, asked Indians to avoid non-essential travel abroad. The fear of being quarantined will impact as much as visa suspension. " We are studying the impact of this order but cancelling some flights and reducing frequency of a few seems the most likely course of action," said an official of a major foreign airline.India gets just over a crore foreign tourists in a year, with 2018 seeing 1.05 crore arrivals. The total number of international passengers to and from India in 2018, according to DGCA data, was 6.3 crore (2019 figures not in yet)."A significant proportion of travellers to India are People of Indian Origin (PIOs) or OCI card holders. The percentage of 'true' foreigners would be about 40%. That category will be impacted, along with business travellers. So this order may not mean emptying of Indian airports but a reduction in flights by foreign airlines," said an airline official.Ixigo co-founder Aloke Bajpai tweeted: "Sacrificing inbound tourism for a month is a small price to pay for preventing a mass pandemic to set foot in India. Bold move from (government) with short term pain but good for long term."A top official of a leading international airline had said on Wednesday afternoon: "Demand for travel has dropped but we are still operating flights due to the international rule which says an airline can lose its airport slots if it does not use 80% of them. Europe is planning to amend this. India has also been asked to consider relaxing this rule. Once that happens, flight cancellations will rise. "After Wednesday night decision, he said "force majeure" - events happening due to circumstanced beyond their control - might force airlines to cancel flights and not use 80% of slots. "In such a situation, we would urge India not to take our slots away if we cancel/reduce flights till the period of travel impacted by visa suspension," the official said.