With India no longer having a national carrier to fall upon, it is private airlines in the country that are being chartered for Operation Ganga, the government’s mission to bring back Indian students stranded in Ukraine following the attack by Russia.On Friday, IndiGo said it was set to operate 51% of all the repatriation flights planned to bring back Indian students by March 6. All such missions were majorly done by Air India in the past with the Indian Air Force (IAF) and other carriers chipping in.Airlines participating in Operation Ganga, besides Air India and IndiGo are Vistara, SpiceJet, Air India Express, and GO FIRST. The IAF is also operating its aircrafts.IndiGo said that in its mission to support the repatriation efforts from Ukraine, the airline was operating the largest number of flights from February 28 to March 6. The airline said it will be operating 42 flights (completed + planned), bringing back over 9,200 Indian citizens back to their homeland by March 6.The airline is operating these flights with its Airbus 321 aircraft. Some of these flights carried relief material on their outward journey to Budapest and Rzeszow while bringing back evacuees on the return leg via Istanbul.Wolfgang Prock-Schauer, president and COO, IndiGo in a statement said, “We have already operated 30 flights bringing back more than 6600 of our citizens till today. IndiGo remains committed to supporting the Government of India in its mission to evacuate Indian citizens from the crisis in Ukraine. We are proud to see our operations team stepping forward to respond to the critical humanitarian need of the hour, enabling the safe return of our stranded citizens back to their families and homes. We will continue to contribute to the country in its time of need.”SpiceJet said it had operated special evacuation flights from Kosice in Slovakia on March 3, and 4 and from Bucharest in Romania on March 4 and 6 to bring home Indian nationals stranded in Ukraine. The airline will use its Boeing 737 MAX aircraft for these special flights.SpiceJet operated ferry flights to Kosice on March 2 and 3 from Delhi and to Bucharest from Delhi and Amritsar on March 4. Another flight will operate on March 5.On Friday, a GO FIRST spokesperson said that the carrier today flew its first evacuation flight to Budapest to bring home stranded Indian nationals. The first flight departed from Delhi at 10.30 a.m. on March 3 and arrived in Budapest via Kuwait at 4 p.m. local time.On the return, the evacuation flight from Budapest departed at 5.58 a.m. local time and arrived with 177 passengers on board the Airbus A320neo at New Delhi at 9.20 a.m. on Friday morning. GO FIRST will operate two flights per day till March 10, 2022, as part of the Operation Ganga mission. “We will also endeavor to provide any additional flights as the Ministry of External Affairs may require,” the airline said.Kaushik Khona, CEO, GO FIRST, said, “GO GIRST will be supporting the Government of India with many more evacuation flights that are required to help Indians return to their loved ones. We hope and pray that everyone stays safe and are back home safely and soon.”
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