Not possible to evacuate Indians from overseas amid lockdown: Centre to Madras High Court

Indian tourists in London (representational image) | Suzanne Plunkett | Bloomberg Chennai: The Centre has informed the Madras High Court that it was not possible for it to organise any evacuation of Indian nationals from any foreign country in the current COVID-19 lockdown situation. The submission was made in a counter to a PIL seeking steps to bring about 350 Indians stranded in Malaysia after visiting the country on tourist visa. Rajagopalan on behalf of the Union Home Ministry, the government submitted that after the global outbreak of COVID- 19 it has proactively taken steps to ensure safety and well- being of Indian nationals abroad as well as people in the country. It said all types of passenger movements through designated immigration land checkposts on the country’s borders with Bangladesh, Nepal and Myanmar border have been suspended so as all scheduled international commercial passenger flights. Travel back of such passengers to different regions of India poses a grave risk to the country having a population of over 1.3 billion. “In such a lockdown situation, it is not possible for the government of India to organise any evacuation of Indian nationals from any country,” the counter said. Petitioner Gunasekar, an advocate, submitted that while the Malaysian government flew back all its nationals stranded in India by arranging a special flight, the centre was not taking any steps to bring its nationals in Malaysia. Besides his client and his family, there were over 350 Indians stranded in Malaysia due to the cancellation of the flight operations following the COVID-19 outbreak. The centre’s response was to a batch of pleas seeking evacuation of Indian citizens from different countries, including United Kingdom and Gulf nations.