New Delhi: Reaching out to 376 COVID negative Indian nationals stranded in Italy, the Indian government hopes to bring them back to New Delhi before the freeze on international flights kicks in on Sunday morning.
Most of those who will come back on the special Air India flight are students from Rome.
A senior officer of the Ministry of Civil Aviation confirmed that the Air India flight left New Delhi on Saturday afternoon to bring them back. The flight is expected to land in New Delhi on Sunday morning. The officer said that till Saturday evening, 262 Indian nationals in Italy had registered with the mission to board the special flight.
This is the second batch of Indian nationals that will be flown back from Italy, the new global epicentre of COVID 19. A week back, India flew back 218 Indian nationals, including 211 students from Italy.
According to foreign agency reports, Italy reported a record 627 new Coronavirus deaths on Friday and saw its world-topping toll touch 4032.
Sources said the Indian immigration authorities will give the India nationals from Italy a speedy clearance after which they will be directly sent to different quarantine facilities for 14 days, where they will be further examined by doctors. The quarantine facilities will be determined by the Health Ministry.
Sources said that the Indian government has so far evacuated more than 2000 Indian nationals from different parts of the world in the wake of the outbreak.
