Indian airlines are yet to open bookings for travel to Dubai and other destinations in the absence of any official notification from UAE authorities on allowing the resumption of flight operations from India, airline officials said.
UAE airlines such as Emirates and Flydubai, however, are to resume passenger flights from Indian cities later this week, following the announcement by the Supreme Committee of Crisis and Disaster Management on Saturday on reopening travel from the country.
The resumption of travel from India will be open to only certain categories of passengers and will be done under strict Covid-19 health and safety protocols.
“Flight bookings to Dubai and other destinations in the UAE have not started yet as our Dubai office has no official message [from the UAE authorities] on resumption of flight operations,” a senior Air India Express official told Arabian Business.
“Our local airport managers [in Dubai] are in touch with the UAE authorities on this,” they added.
Air India Express was operating the maximum number of flights to the UAE prior to the flight ban from April 24 under the ‘air bubble’ arrangement between the two countries.
Vistara, the only full service Indian private carrier, also said it was awaiting confirmation from UAE authorities before resuming bookings and operations.
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“Vistara has no notification [on resumption of flight services to the UAE],” a spokesperson of the airline told Arabian Business.
IndiGo, India’s largest airline by market share and a major player in the India-Gulf sector, also confirmed to Arabian Business that it has not opened flight bookings for any destination in the UAE yet.
Emirates has announced that the UAE carrier will resume carrying passengers from India from June 23.
Emirates welcomes the latest protocols and measures announced by Dubai's Supreme Committee of Crisis and Disaster Management to allow the safe resumption of passenger travel from South Africa, Nigeria and India to Dubai. (1/3) https://t.co/AFq1HMuLiu
— Emirates Airline (@emirates) June 19, 2021
Industry sources told Arabian Business that the airlines are awaiting a uniform standard operating procedure (SOP) for all airports in India by the UAE authorities before announcing booking and flight plans to Dubai, among the most popular travel destinations of Indian passengers – both to the Gulf country and also for transit travel around the world.
“We expect this to come by today [Monday] late afternoon, post which we plan to open the flight bookings for the UAE,” an Indian airline official said.
Flight reservation agency sources said Indian carriers are also going slow on their plans to resume flights to Dubai due to a lack of excitement among passengers from the South Asian country to travel to the UAE because of the requirement of mandatory quarantine and other guidelines.
As per the announcement on travel from India, only passengers with a valid UAE residence visa and who have received two doses of a UAE-approved vaccine are allowed to travel to Dubai.
Passengers should also present a negative test certificate from a PCR test taken 48 hours before departure; UAE nationals are exempted from this requirement. Only QR-coded negative PCR test certificates are accepted.
“Most of the Indian passengers holding UAE residency visas have already left either prior to the ban or taking the chartered flights by private operators or some of the UAE airlines,” Amit Udani, executive director of Fly Aerolink Travel Trade, a Mumbai-based travel services provider, told Arabian Business.
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