A total of 1.41 million people from Kerala were brought back from various countries under the Vande Bharat Mission, the Centre has informed a parliamentary committee.
The Vande Bharat mission was launched by the Union government to bring back Indians stranded across the world during the Covid-19 pandemic.
According to state-wise data, the second largest group of people rescued were from Delhi (1.33 million).
Saudi Arabia, USA, Qatar and Oman ranked behind the UAE. These five countries accounted for nearly 4.1 million Indians who returned home, according to government data.
According to the data, the maximum number of people brought back under the mission were from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) –2.54 million. The country is an established hub for expat Indians.
The government repatriated Indian citizens from more than 100 countries under the mission, including 10,303 people from Kyrgyzstan, 400 from Mongolia, 157 from Syria and 4,697 from Rwanda.
Data furnished to the external affairs panel of Parliament also said that, “As per the registration data on MEA’s online portal, of the total arrived passengers, 39.2 per cent are workers, 39.1 per cent are professionals, 5.9 per cent are students, 7.8 per cent visitors and 4.8 per cent Indian tourists stranded in foreign countries.”Both Air India and private carriers operated a total of more than 88,000 inbound flights and more than 87,600 outbound flights for the mission for which tickets had to be purchased by the passengers.
Foreign secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla told the panel, “There are some specialties of the Vande Bharat Mission. Firstly, this is by far the biggest evacuation ever conducted. The nearest we saw was that during the Kuwait Crisis (1991), Air India had evacuated about 1.1 lakh (110,000) people only… At that time, Kuwait was one destination and now, we are flying all over the world.”
Officials have also informed the House panel that passengers were chosen on the basis of compelling grounds such as those facing deportation by foreign governments, migrant workers/labourers who were laid off, non-permanent residents/short-term visa holders faced with expiry of visas, those facing medical emergency/seeking treatment for terminal illness, pregnant women/elderly, those required to return to India due to death of a family member, tourists/visitors stranded abroad and students if their educational institutions/hostels are closed.
Apart from the top five centres of repatriation, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Bahrain, Canada, Germany and Singapore too, were embarkation points of a significant number of home-bound Indians, the data stated.
“The ministry of external affairs has also assisted over 120 nations to safely evacuate their nationals stranded in India during the lockdown,” Shringla informed the panel.
