New Delhi: In what comes as good news for travellers, Singapore has announced that it will allow quarantine-free travel for Indians from November 29. Moreover, the country will also open ‘Vaccinated Travel Lanes (VTL)’ for four other nations — Finland, Indonesia, Malaysia and Sweden, in a bid to reclaim and rebuild its status as an international aviation hub with global connectivity. At present, 13 countries including Canada, Australia and Germany are under Singapore’s vaccinated travel lane (VTL) programme.

While travellers from India and Indonesia will be able to enter Singapore under the quarantine-free travel scheme from November 29, quarantine-free travel from Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) will begin from December 6, the country’s health ministry said in a statement on Monday.

Guidelines to be followed by people travelling to Singapore

  • All travellers entering Singapore under the VTL will have to comply with the prevailing VTL requirements.
  • VTL travellers must have remained in one or more of the VTL countries in the last 14 consecutive days prior to departure to Singapore.
  • If the traveller has been in Singapore within those last 14 days, his/her stay in Singapore can be counted towards fulfilling this 14-day travel history requirement.
  • All VTL travellers must take two COVID-19 PCR tests: -A pre-departure test within 48 hours before departing to Singapore and obtain a negative test result;  An on-arrival test at Changi Airport and remain self-isolated until their test result is confirmed to be negative.
  • Children aged 2 years and below in the calendar year2 are not required to undergo these tests.
  • Vaccination is a key safeguard of the VTL for safe quarantine-free travel without compromising public health.
  • All VTL travellers must have been fully vaccinated and present their proof of vaccination issued in any VTL country or Singapore, regardless of which VTL country the traveller departs from.
  • Children aged 12 years and below in the calendar year are not required to present a proof of vaccination to enter Singapore under the VTL if they are accompanied by a VTL traveller who meets all VTL requirements for entry into Singapore.

Speaking to reporters, Transport Minister S Iswaran said Singapore and India have been discussing the mutual recognition of vaccination certificates. “Our discussions with India are progressing well. And we aim to resume two daily VTL flights each to Chennai, Delhi and Mumbai by Nov 29. The Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore (CAAS) will provide more details once finalised,” a CNA report quoted him as saying.

Since November 12, India has started recognising vaccination certificates issued by Singapore. This means that fully vaccinated travellers from Singapore entering India will no longer need to undergo post-arrival tests home quarantine, they will just need to self monitor for 14 days upon arrival.

Meanwhile, the Singapore health ministry has also updated its public health assessment and will upgrade India to Category 2 from November 19. The Category 2 classification means that a country either has similar or lower Covid-19 incidence rates than Singapore and other VTL countries.

Currently, 6000 people are allowed to enter the city-state, each day, under the programme. With the addition of new countries, (the number of people) will increase to 10,000.  As per the reports, over 24,000 fully vaccinated visitors have arrived in Singapore under the arrangement as of November 14.