AFTER 16 days, passenger flights from the UK to India restarted on Friday (8).
The flights were suspended due to the emergence of a new coronavirus variant in Britain.
The first Air India flight after the suspension landed at the Delhi airport from London with 256 passengers, Gauri Agarwal, founder of the Genestrings Diagnostic Center, told PTI.
Genestrings is handling coronavirus testing of all passengers at the Delhi airport.
One Vistara flight with 291 passengers will come from London to Delhi on Saturday(9) and two flights - one of British Airways and another of Air India - with a total of 481 passengers will land at the Delhi airport on Sunday(10), she added.
Indian aviation minister Hardeep Singh Puri had announced earlier this month that only 30 flights per week will operate between India and the UK between January 8 and January 23.
Indian and UK carriers will each be operating 15 flights per week during the period.
Earlier this month, the health ministry stated that a passenger coming from the UK can board a flight to India only when he has a negative test report from a sample taken 72 hours prior to the journey.
Moreover, as per the rules, the passenger also has to take the RT-PCR test on arrival at the entry airport in India.
Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal has announced that travellers coming from the UK to the national capital will have to undergo a seven-day institutional quarantine and a seven-day home quarantine even if they test negative for Covid-19 on arrival.
Over 60 passenger flights per week were flying between the countries before India suspended all flights on December 23 over the 'UK virus'.
Damian Talbot