Citing humanitarian grounds, the Union Health Ministry has revised the mandatory international travel guidelines for all Indians being evacuated from war-torn Ukraine, permitting them to board flights without a negative RT-PCR test report or a full-vaccination certificate.
“The Ministry of Health & Family Welfare in close collaboration with the Ministry of External Affairs and Ministry of Civil Aviation and Ministry of Home Affairs is lending all support possible in evacuating Indians from Ukraine,” said a statement issued here.
Indian nationals are also exempted from uploading documents before departure on Air-Suvidha Portal.
Individuals who have completed their Covid-19 vaccination, irrespective of the country of departure or vaccination, have been allowed to leave the arrival airport in India with the advice to self-monitor their health for the next 14 days, the Ministry said.
In case a traveler is not able to submit a pre arrival RT PCR test or has not completed their Covid-19 vaccination, the government has allowed them to submit their samples on arrival.
As on February 28, at least 1,396 Indians from Ukraine have arrived in India with none of the passengers kept under isolation.
On February 10, the Ministry in view of declining Covid cases had relaxed the international travel guidelines with no mandatory 7-day isolation or compulsory RT-PCR testing for fully vaccinated.
Government had also removed the demarcation of countries ‘at-risk’ and other countries. With this the requirement of giving samples on port of arrival and waiting till the result is obtained from countries ‘at-risk’ was done away with.
India reported 8,013 new cases in the last 24 hours as of Monday morning. The weekly test positivity rate in the country currently stands at 1.17 per cent and the daily positivity rate is reported to be 1.11 per cent.