Staff Reporter :
59 Bangladeshi returned home from India’s Kolkata on Sunday on a special flight of Biman Bangladesh Airlines after being stranded in the neighbouring country for more than one and half months due to flight suspension amid the Covid-19 outbreak.
Carrying the Bangladeshi citizens, a chartered flight of Biman landed at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport (HSIA) at 3:40pm, Tahera Khandaker, said deputy general manager (public relations) of Biman.
Another charted flight of the national flag carrier carrying a hundred Bangladeshi nationals from Mumbai is scheduled to land at HSIA around 7:00pm on Sunday, sources at the airport said.
As per the government’s decision, all returnee Bangladeshis are scheduled to remain in 14-day institutional quarantine if they fail to show medical certificates upon arrival at the airport that they have been tested negative for Covid-19.
From April 20 till Sunday, around 1,750 Bangladeshi nationals, most of whom went to India for medical treatment, were brought back from the neighboring country on 12 chartered flights of US-Bangla Airlines and Biman, sources at HSIA said.
Of the 12 special flights, US-Bangla Airlines operated eight while Biman operated four.
The Bangladesh High Commission in India earlier said they have kept their efforts on to facilitate the return of more Bangladeshis who are still stranded in India.
Biman is scheduled to operate one more special flight on May 5 from Delhi to bring back stranded Bangladeshis, Tahera Khandaker said.
