Foreigners paid dearly to fly out

U.S. nationals had to cough up nearly three times the normal one-way fare

24/04/2020, S. VIJAY KUMAR ,CHENNAI

Foreign nationals at the Kolkata airport to board a special flight recently. AFP

24.04.2020

Hundreds of foreign nationals stranded in India during the COVID-19 lockdown flew home in chartered flights organised by their home countries in coordination with airlines and the Government of India in recent weeks. However, the evacuation trips did not come for free and they were not affordable either.

While the U.S. nationals had to pay anywhere between $2,000 and $2,500 per person from New Delhi to San Francisco or Mumbai to Atlanta, British nationals had to spend between £500 and £600 despite the U.K. government allocating £75 million for chartered flights from countries where commercial flight operations were not available.

Loan option

However, the U.S. gave a loan option to its nationals and even took a promissory note allowing them to fly and pay later. The U.K. government offered conditional loans that many could not avail while flying out of India. U.S. nationals were informed that if they failed to repay the loan, they would not be eligible for issue of new passport. Only U.S. citizens with confirmation with U.S. Mission to India were allowed to board the flights.

“Please understand this flight is not free. All passengers will need to reimburse the U.S. government for the cost of the flight. Previous flights have cost between $2,000 and 2,500 per person. A legal document, called a promissory note, for the full cost of the flight must be signed by each adult passenger. However, payment is not required at the time of the flight,” the U.S. Embassy in India said in a travel advisory to its nationals.

Responding to an announcement put out on Twitter by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office that U.K. travellers should return home and £75 million had been allocated to support special chartered flights where commercial options were no longer available, an aspiring flyer replied wondering why people were being charged £600 from India if so much money was earmarked. Another traveller said the tickets were “quite expensive” for one way and sought to know how he could take the loan. However, he was informed that he should attempt to use his own financial means to arrange return to the U.K..

No relief

“I had to pay £1,088 for travel from Delhi to London for myself and my three-year-old daughter. This is more than double the normal fare... we usually pay £862 for return ticket on the same sector. We are British nationals and the U.K. government should have considered some subsidy if not free repatriation,” said Neha Chauhan, a banking professional in London who took a British Airways flight from Delhi on April 21, 2020.

Early this month, the U.K. government said that over 3,000 British travellers, including tourists, short-term travellers and their direct dependents, currently stranded in India could get home on an additional 12 chartered flights for which bookings opened on April 10, 2020. Travellers who could not afford the cost and had exhausted all other options for getting funds were told to contact a commercial partner for seeking loan. “You may be eligible to apply for an emergency loan to cover the cost of the ticket. This is a last resort option and you would need to repay the loan when you are back in the U.K.,” the advisory said.

Srikanth, an IT director in a reputed firm in Washington DC and a native of Visakhapatnam, said the fare was almost thrice compared to the normal one-way trip from Delhi to San Francisco or Mumbai to Atlanta, the sectors in which the rescue flights were operated. “Travellers were told to report to the nearest U.S. Consulate for a health check-up. This fare is much more than what is sold during peak holiday season. Many stayed back hoping that flights will resume soon after the lockdown in India,” he said.

Many other countries including Australia, Japan and others operated special flights to move their nationals stranded in India. Their pricing details were not available for comparison though airport sources said that most of the rescue planes charged double since they would fly back empty.