Goa: ‘It’s a great relief to finally be returning to our families’

MARGAO: After weeks of battling anxiety on the luxury cruise liner, Diamond Princess, which was quarantined off the coast of Japan since February 3 due to cases of coronavirus on board, Dhanesh Raikar from Chinchinim finally got airborne to return to his motherland.
Raikar, along with at least 50 other Goans, is among the 138 Indians on Diamond Princess who have been flown back to India by an Air India aircraft chartered by the Indian government.
The aircraft was expected to land at New Delhi airport late on Wednesday.
“It’s such a great relief to finally be returning to our country and to our families in good health. On board the ship, we were allowed to breathe fresh air for hardly a couple of hours every day. Amid the looming threat of contracting the virus, many among us were on the verge of depression. We are thankful to the government of India for making arrangements to bring us back to India,” Raikar told TOI from Japan’s Haneda airport before boarding the flight.
However, it could be several days before Raikar and his fellow seamen are able to have a happy reunion with their families. The Indian crew members repatriated from Japan are likely to undergo 14 days of quarantine on their arrival in New Delhi.
On Tuesday, the ambassador of India to Japan, Sanjay Kumar Verma, replied to commissioner for NRI affairs Narendra Sawaikar who had earlier written to him inquiring about the safety of the Goans on board the vessel assuring him that “arrangements for bringing them back to India are being made, and very soon they will be in their motherland”.
The Indian embassy in Japan had on Tuesday announced that a chartered flight was being arranged to repatriate Indian nationals on board Diamond Princess, provided that they have given their consent, haven’t tested positive for coronavirus, and have been cleared by the medical team.
Dixon Vaz, spokesperson of the Goan Seamen Association of India, had told TOI that the shipping company has promised to pay two months salary to all the crew members who were on board during this period.
The vessel was quarantined when it arrived in Yokohama earlier this month after it emerged that a passenger who had disembarked in Hong Kong in January had tested positive for the respiratory illness. Altogether 16 Indians on board the vessel tested positive for the virus and were being hospitalised, it was informed.