A record five lakh Indian nationals, stranded in various corners of the world, have returned home under the government's Vande Bharat Mission (VBM), the country's largest-ever repatriation effort. The fourth phase of this mission began today.
The mission began on May 7 after India reopened its skies for the first time since mid-March. The operation was helmed by the Ministry of External Affairs and is a multi-agency one, with the Ministry of Civil Aviation, the Home Ministry and state governments all working in a coordinated manner to sift through the applicant lists, plan flights, and arrange quarantine of the returning nationals.
The initial target was to bring back Indians with the most compelling reasons to return (job loss, health reasons, age), and two lakh of those registered came under this category. But, given that an additional 3,03,990 have also been repatriated, the mission has far extended its original aim.
While initially, only Air India was operating the repatriation flights, subsequently private carriers like Indigo and Vistara also joined in. As per the MEA, the mission involved 860 Air India flights, 1,256 charter flights and eight naval ship sorties. However, chartered flights brought the bulk of the returnees—2,30,8322, and Air India 1,64,121.
The Indian Navy brought home 3,987 Indians in eight sorties from the Maldives, Iran and Colombo. Foreign carriers, which flew to India to evacuate their own countrymen, brought 3,969 Indians. The land borders brought home 96,220 from Bangladesh, Bhutan and Nepal. Some returned via air ambulances, too. The government has used various methods of reaching out to Indians, designating certain cities like Frankfurt as hubs for Europe. It used the hub and spoke method at both ends, to facilitate the reach of people to their homes, and readied a number of smaller airports for this task.
In the early phases of lockdown, when road transport was still under tight control, it was important for passengers to be brought as close to their final destination as possible.
Kerala received the largest number of repatriates—94,085. The other big recipient states were Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Gujarat, and Andhra Pradesh. The largest number of Indians returned from the UAE (57,305), followed by other Gulf nations, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman, Saudi Arabia. The largest number of nationals returning from the land border was from Nepal—91,193.
India's largest evacuation mission before Vande Bharat was 30 years ago, during the Kuwait War when Indian brought home around 1.7 lakh civilians. Air India holds a Guinness Record for that event, for the largest ever repatriation operation by an airline. While India has brought home nationals in distress on several occasions, this is the first time that the repatriations are paid ones. The government justified it saying that this time, people aren't being rescued from a dangerous place to a safer one.
Also, the cost would be phenomenal on the government, given that the national carrier is already gasping for breath. Also, the nature of the operation this time was unique, with crew and passengers having to follow the social distancing protocol, limiting passengers in flights and the additional cost of tests and protection equipment.
(The story first appeared in The Week)