Operation Ajay: The fifth flight arranged by the Indian government to rescue Indian as well as Nepalese nationals landed at Delhi's Indira Gandhi International Airport in the wee hours on Wednesday. The SpiceJet flight carried 286 passengers, including 18 Nepalese nationals.
This is the second SpiceJet flight to be operated under the government's Operation Ajay to facilitate the return of Indians who wish to come back from Israel where an intense conflict is going on with the militant group Hamas.
In a post on social media platform X, External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said that 286 passengers, including 18 Nepalese nationals, arrived on board the fifth flight under Operation Ajay. He also shared pictures of the passengers being welcomed at the airport by Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting L Murugan. The flight departed from the war-torn country on Tuesday.
The SpiceJet aircraft A340 had faced a technical issue after landing at Tel Aviv on Sunday and the plane was taken to Jordan to rectify the problem. After fixing the issue, the plane returned with people from Tel Aviv on Tuesday. The aircraft was originally scheduled to return to the national capital on Monday morning.
Meanwhile, Nepalese Ambassador to Israel Kanta Rizal told news agency PTI that some of the 18 Nepalese citizens were living in difficult zones amid the Israel-Hamas war and wanted to go back to their own countries. "We sent 254 Nepalese citizens on the Nepal Airlines on October 12 and may look to arrange more flights to take them out," she said.
Guidelines for returnees
According to officials, the Embassy has been working round the clock to facilitate all our citizens in Israel who wish to leave. "The travel slots will be allocated on a 'first come, first served' basis in the 'Operation Ajay' and "In the event of a no-show or refusal to travel after confirmation and slotting, your name will be moved to the back of the queue," the Indian Embassy's guidelines read.
Ambassador Sanjeev Singla said Embassy officials had reached out to students, caregivers, and business people and some of them were actually working with them as volunteers. We urge everyone to remain calm, he added.
The passengers are chosen on a "first come first serve" basis after a drive launched by the Indian embassy for all Indians to register at the mission's database. The government is bearing the cost of their return. The first charter flight from Israel carried 212 people last Thursday. The second batch of 235 Indian nationals was flown back late on Friday. So far, a total of 918 Indian nationals have been flown out of Israel.
The brutal attack by Hamas on Israel claimed the lives of at least 1,400 people. Israeli strikes have killed at least 2,778 people and wounded 9,700 others in Gaza, according to the Health Ministry.
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