India is in self-isolation mode, but the mantra of athithi devo bhava (guest is god) still stands. The ministry of tourism has launched a website—strandedinindia.com—to help foreigners stuck in India.
The website aims to help foreigners stay safe and, ultimately, find their way back home. It provides emergency numbers for tourists stranded in India and also allows them to log in their location so that they can get assistance from state governments.
Several embassies in Delhi have taken on the mammoth task of getting their respective nationals home during the lockdown. “The Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany and Kerala Tourism worked together for the successful repatriation of 232 German and EU nationals in Kerala. Today, all the tourists were able to return to Frankfurt,” tweeted Kerala Tourism on Tuesday.
A total number of 1,100 travellers from Germany and some from EU were taken back to Frankfurt. Germany has declared lockdown till April 20.
Embassies are working round-the-clock to get their nationals back home. This has not been an easy task as there are tourists stranded across the country. In a message to its citizens, the US Embassy has asked its nationals to register online. The embassy has alerted its citizens in India that there will be flights from New Delhi and Mumbai, later in the week.
“The United States Mission to India continues to coordinate repatriation flights from India. These flights are for US citizens ad certain Legal Permanent Residents on a space-available basis only,” the notice read. While the details of the price haven’t been worked out, the notice suggest that the price of the flight would be comparable to full-fare in the pre-coronavirus times. Flights will also have limited weight.
In the past week, 2,500 Afghans have been flown from Delhi to Kabul, according to the Afghan Embassy in India.
Meanwhile, India has extended all visas of foreigners in India to April 15 because of the lockdown. A notification issued by the ministry’s Foreigners Regional Registration Office (FRRO) has allowed foreigners stranded to apply for visa extensions online. There will be no visa fee.
