Kochi: As many as 588 Indian nationals stranded in the Maldives due to COVID-19-induced international travel restrictions were brought home on Sunday on an Indian Navy warship.
The passengers, including 70 women and 21 children, were brought to Kerala's Kochi on Sunday morning on board Indian Navy vessel INS Jalashwa as part of the second phase of the repatriation drive Operation Samudra Setu.
On May 12, the vessel had successfully brought home 698 Indian nationals from Maldives to Kochi in the first phase.
Another Navy Ship INS Magar under "Operation Samudra Setu" had evacuated 202 Indian citizens from Maldives to Kochi on Tuesday.
Operation Samudra Setu of the Indian Navy is a part of the Vande Bharat Mission, India's massive repatriation mission to bring home its citizens stranded in various countries due to the COVID-19 lockdown.
In a tweet, the High Commission of India in Maldives has expressed its gratitude to the government of the island nation for ensuring safe repatriation of stranded Indian citizens.
"We are extremely grateful to the Govt. of #Maldives and all concerned agencies in ensuring safe and secure repatriation of nearly 1500 Indian nationals from the Maldives under Op. #SamudraSetu," the Indian High Commission tweeted.
The Indian nationals were screened medically, allotted IDs and their baggage sanitised before boarding the ship.
Under the Vande Bharat Mission, Air India has been operating special flights to various countries to bring back Indian citizens since May 7. In the first phase that ended on May 14, Air India, along with its subsidiary Air India Express, operated a total of 64 flights (42 by Air India and 24 by AI Express) to 12 countries including the US, the UK, Bangladesh, Singapore, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the Philippines, UAE and Malaysia to repatriate over thousands of Indians.
In the second phase, which began on Saturday, 149 flights will be operated from 31 countries till May 22.
So far, 3,303 people have been brought to Kerala as part of the programme while the Indian Navy has brought 900 passengers on two ships.
India has been under lockdown since March 25 to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus,, which has infected over 85,000 people and killed more than 2,800 persons in the country till now.
All scheduled commercial passenger flights have been suspended for the lockdown period.