Following a recovery in the country's Covid-19 crisis, the civil aviation ministry has eased various pandemic-related restrictions. The concessions were made in order to promote the smooth functioning of aviation operations.
Cabin crew members will no longer be obliged to wear PPE kits, according to an order issued by the civil aviation ministry on Monday. "Airlines may carry a few additional PPE protective gears, sanitiser, and N-95 masks to handle any respiratory infections related to cases on board, for both passengers and crew," the ministry's order stated.
Face masks and hand hygiene/sanitiser will, however, continue to be mandatory.
In addition, airlines are no longer compelled to leave three seats available on foreign flights in the case of a medical emergency.
The third and final relaxation is that airport security officials can restart pat-down searches of passengers, according to the government. "During the process, the security personnel must wear N-95 mask and sanitise hands after each pat-down search, besides following regular Covid-19 protocols," the directive stated.
Domestic flights were restarted in India from October of last year, while international flights are set to resume on March 27.
Because of the fast-spreading Omicron variant of Covid-19, which was the major cause of the third wave of the pandemic in India, international flights were halted in the country. Since the end of January, the number of daily infections has been decreasing.
Covid-19 has caused 4,30,10,971 instances in India so far. The country recorded a new low of 1,581 infections in the past 24 hours on Tuesday. This is the third day in a row that the daily total has fallen below 2,000.
