299 Nepali women brought home from Kuwait (with photos)

Published On: June 11, 2020 02:37 PM NPT By: Dipesh Shrestha

KATHMANDU, June 11: As many as 299 Nepali women stranded in Kuwait were brought back to Nepal on Thursday.

Two Jazeera Airways aircraft carried 150 and 149 passengers each and touched down at Tribhuvan International Airport (TIA) on Thursday afternoon. “The first flight landed at 11:30 am and the second flight at 2:10 pm, carrying all-women passengers,” said Deo Chandra Lal Karna, spokesperson for TIA.

According to a schedule prepared by the Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation (MoCTCA), the repatriation flights will be carried out from June 11 to June 25. “The airport is prepared to handle all kinds of passengers,” Karna told Republica Online, adding that if passengers have any complications the airport has special handling services for them.

The government has scheduled a total of 67 evacuation flights in the period of 15 days. Nepal-based international airlines will carry out 43 flights whereas international airlines will fly 24 flights.

Nepal Airlines Corporation (NAC) will conduct 24 flights to destinations like Dhaka, the Maldives, Malaysia, Dubai, Qatar, Bahrain, Thailand, Japan, among others. Similarly, Himalaya Airlines will operate 19 flights to Sri Lanka, Singapore, Saudi Arabia and other destinations to bring the stranded Nepalis home.

However, the government has said that the scheduled flights are subject to change. The flights will be carried out only if the occupancy rate is 85 percent or more.

All the passengers are required to produce a RDT or a PCR test report before boarding the planes. And after arriving in Nepal, they should stay in quarantine as per the government’s guideline. The passengers will be sent to holding centers prepared by the government and later will be shifted to provincial and other quarantine facilities according to their preference and affordability. Hotels have offered to provide their space as quarantine facilities with charges. The quarantined will be provided with four meals a day at a price as minimum as Rs 2,000 for shared rooms and Rs 3,000 for a single room.