Overseas flights unlikely before July, airlines told to not take bookings

India is unlikely to allow international flights to take off from its land before July as new cases of coronavirus continue to emerge both within and outside the country, according to sources familiar with the development.
“Worldover, and definitely in India too, it has been seen that unrestricted movement of people from overseas was among the key carriers and reasons behind the spread of the virus. Thus, the government will be in no hurry to open the skies for international travel. Domestic travel can of course be accommodated earlier," one source said.
Incidentally, the ministry of civil aviation was forced to intervene late Saturday night after Air India reopened its booking window in the morning the same day. Air India said it had opened bookings for travel from 4 May and 1 June on select domestic and international routes, respectively.
“The Ministry of Civil Aviation clarifies that so far no decision has been taken to open domestic or international operations. Airlines are advised to open their bookings only after a decision in this regard has been taken by the Government," civil aviation minister Hardeep Puri said in a late night tweet Saturday.
Air India’s website was still carrying the advertisement at the time of publishing this news.
India, a country of 1.3 billion people, has implemented the strictest lockdown amongst all the countries in the world. This has been effective in trebling the number of days for doubling of covid-19 cases to almost 10 days from three some weeks ago. The government is thus loath to compromise on international travel ban anytime soon lest its success in controlling the virus suffers a setback, another source said.
Much will also depend on the measures other countries take to control the pandemic on their land. Restarting the flights will thus be in phases, depending on the status of the cases in a particular country and the region around it, the second source said.

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