Over 300 Indian nationals repatriated from the Maldives on Saturday

A group of Indian nationals have been evacuated from the Maldives on Saturday.

Making the reveal via Twitter, the High Commission of India in the Maldives highlighted that a total of 339 Indian nationals were repatriated on Saturday bound to Tiruchirapalli and New Delhi.

A private charter flight departed from Velana International Airport (VIA) to Tiruchirapalli International Airport with 170 passengers onboard earlier on Saturday and 169 passengers departed for New Delhi, via a chartered flight, both from IndiGo.

HCI revealed that they will be continuing to facilitate the process of evacuation of Indian nationals by private airlines.

Through a major operation to evacuate Indians stranded in different regions across the globe, the Indian government has also been repatriating Indians stranded in the Maldives, and the number has since surpassed 2,500 with the fourth voyage evacuating over 700 Indian nationals.

Earlier, 1,488 were evacuated via two Navy ships; INS Jalashwa and INS Magar on three different evacuation voyages and with the fourth one, the total number of evacuees exceeded 2,500.

As part of the repatriation exercise, Indian navy boat INS Airavat arrived in the capital city for the fifth voyage, set for Sunday.

HCI revealed that their endeavor has been to repatriate the “most needy” categories of Indians including pregnant women, cases of medical emergencies and workers.

Some of the returnees had tested positive for Covid-19 upon arrival in India.

Throughout the biggest ever repatriation exercise amid the Covid-19 pandemic, India has evacuated over 14,000 of its citizens stranded across various parts of the globe.