The Embassy of India, Abu Dhabi and Consulate General of India, Dubai have issued a new SOP for chartered flights from the UAE and some other countries, from June 25, 2020.

Under the guidelines, the following steps will be required to be followed for chartering a flight from UAE to India for repatriation:

  • Chartering entities should identify an Air Transport Operator (ATO) on their own.
  • ATOs need to send their flight plans, state clearance forms and passenger manifests directly to the destination state along with a copy to the embassy/consulate. While the embassy/consulate will vet the passenger manifest, the ATO simultaneously should directly proceed to get state clearance for the flight in writing.
  • Once the state clearance is in hand, the ATO should take a No Objection Certification (NOC) for the manifest from the embassy/consulate.
  • With the state clearance and NOC from the embassy/consulate, the ATO should approach the DGCA for flight clearance.
  • States and ATOs should manage the flight schedule, frequency, etc with regards to all arriving passengers. They should also coordinate with each other where chartered flights have mixed domicile passengers.
  • Where required, chartering entities should finalise quarantine arrangements with the states directly.