Scheduled international flights to and from India are restarting on Sunday after a gap of more than two years.

Earlier this week, India’s Ministry of Civil Aviation updated the rules for international travel in light of the resumption of scheduled international flights.?

The relaxations include –

• Flight cabin crew is not required to wear PPE kits
• Flights need not keep three seats vacant for medical emergency purposes?

However, the wearing of masks, the maintenance of hand hygiene, and usage of hand sanitisers remains mandatory.?

Pat-down searches whenever required by security staff at airports have also been resumed, as per directions of the Bureau of Civil Aviation Security.

“During the process, the security personnel must wear N-95 mask and sanitise hands after each pat-down search, besides following regular COVID-19 protocols,” according to the civil aviation ministry’s order.?

Airlines are also advised to put in place certain precautionary measures. The ministry has said that airlines may carry some additional PPE gear, sanitiser, and N-95 masks to handle any respiratory infections related to cases on air for passengers as well as the flight crew.

The Government of India had suspended scheduled international travel on 23 March 2020 in light of the emergence of COVID-19. While regular flights remained suspended, India entered into bilateral agreements with countries and formed air bubbles, leading to operations of flights with around 40 countries from July 2020.?

With PTI inputs