Bihar: Most of foreign returnees can’t pay for quarantine

GAYA: Most of the about 13,000 foreign returnees could not afford paid quarantine at notified facilities at Bodh Gaya. Whereas those opting for paid quarantine are put in hotels and guesthouses at pre-fixed rates, those who cannot afford paid quarantine are accommodated in the Nigma monastery and MU campus.
According to Gaya DM Abhishek Singh, the government has to spend more than Rs2000 per foreign returnee who cannot afford paid quarantine. As per the SOP notified for foreign returnees, they have to spend seven days under institutional quarantine and another seven days under home quarantine.
Gaya, it may be recalled, has been notified as the disembarkation point for foreign returnees who are the residents of Bihar and Jharkhand. Whereas, all Bihar-origin returnees are put under institutional quarantine at notified facilities in Bodh Gaya, the Jharkhand origin returnees are transferred to Ranchi for institutional quarantine.
Though, neither the officials associated with the Vande Bharat Mission nor the Airports Authority of India have released separate figures for Jharkhand-origin returnees, reliable estimates say more than 85% of the foreign returnees are from Bihar. Besides, workers who lost their jobs in the Middle East countries on account of the Covid-19 pandemic, students, tourists and other international travellers stranded abroad are being evacuated.
According to Gaya airport director Dilip Kumar, whereas Air India and IndiGo have operated special flights under the Vande Bharat Mission, other repatriation and chartered flights have been operated by airlines like Fly Dubai, Jazeera Airways, Kuwait Airlines, Etehad, Qatar Airways, SpiceJet, Air Arabia, Salam Airways, Thai Air Asia, Thai Smile, Myanmar National Airways, Myanmar Airways International. He further said the total number of foreign returnees from May 18 till date was 12,728. Of them, 2180 have been evacuated by Air India and IndiGo under the Vande Bharat Mission.
Altogether 82 special flights have been operated at Gaya airport to evacuate/repatriate Bihar-Jharkhand people from abroad. Of these, 10 special flights have been operated by Air India under the Vande Bharat Mission. IndiGo has operated 7 special flights under the VBM. The remaining 65 flights have been operated by SpiceJet and several foreign airlines.