Helpless Indian Pros, students approach Korean authorities, Airlines to fly from India to Korea
NEW DELHI: With no help coming from the Indian government for arranging rescue flights from India to South Korea, Indian nationals have finally reached out to Korean authorities and aviation companies for hiring chartered services.
In the process, these Indians stranded in India including professionals, students, and families are forced to pay through their noses. Each ticket potentially costs 72,000-82,000 INR as against the average Air India airfare of 45,000 INR.
Indian aviation authorities had run two flights, one each from India to Korea and back to India on June 6 and 7 respectively under Vande Bharat Mission (VBM). After that, Indian authorities have pulled back, and are operating Air India flights to other countries. Many are paying house rent in Korea even though they are stuck in India.
Hundreds of Indians stranded in India are on the verge of losing jobs, in fact, many have already been fired) in Korea for not reporting to the office since March. Students and researchers associated with various universities in Korea are missing their studies since then.
The Indian nationals have formed various groups on various social media platforms like Whatsapp and Telegram to coordinate, share information and to know the number of people stranded in India since March when the lockdown was clamped in India and international flights were canceled as one of the measures by the Indian government to check the spread of COVID-19 pandemic.
These groups formed a COVID-19 emergency on Whatsapp and Telegram, and Delhi-Seoul (July 10th) Tentative
group on Telegram are separately negotiating with Korean airlines like Korean Air and Asiana for flights to India to be operated before June 29, on July 3 and 10.
Manish Patil, an executive with a Korean MNC said that since negotiations with Air India could not be worked out, the Indians were forced to turn to charter flight options and were negotiating with Korean airlines.
“We are trying to get Korean Air flight from India to Korea before June 30 as visas of many Indians stranded in India is about to expire. We have urged the Korean through their embassy in Seoul to secure a chartered Korean Air flight for India. We have shared a list of about 200 Indians stuck in the Indian government,” he said.
Flights are being sought from either of various locations including New Delhi, Bangalore, Kolkata, and Hyderabad in India. Some of the Indians managed to get seats in the Asiana flights operating from India to Korea on June 20 for the Korean nationals employed with LG, Samsung, and Hyundai.
Vibhu Jain, the marketing head (Asia) with a life sciences MNC in Korea, was lucky enough to get a ticket in June 6 flight from India to Korea for himself and his family, is now helping other stranded Indians to get a flight for them. Jain formed a telegram group of Indians – Delhi-Seoul (July 10th) Tentative for the purpose.
“During my stay in India when the lockdown was announced, I and my family suffered a huge amount of hardship but was lucky to secure tickets, though at a very high cost of 2,000 USD each in business class on June 6 flight, many are still left out. A person like me can manage such a huge amount of airfare but not the average professional or student. I formed the group to help our fellow Indians, especially the students for whom we are trying to get concession in airfare,” said Jain.
Negotiations with Indian airliners like Air India and Spicejet could not be worked out, following which the Indians turned to Korean airlines. The Indian embassy in Seoul has expressed its inability to help Indians in this matter saying that the VBM flights were meant for the Indians stranded abroad, not for the ones in India.
Another lot of Indian nationals wrote on their social media groups, wrote, “ We are planning to request Korean Air for a special flight from India to Korea. It will be possible if the number of participants is 170. The price will be around 11,90,000 Korean won. We will try to arrange special discounts for students.”
