India, Singapore commercial flights may resume soon, talks on

Singapore is in talks with the Ministry of External Affairs and Ministry of Civil Aviation to resume scheduled commercial services with two daily flights each from Delhi, Mumbai and Chennai.

Currently, only repatriation is happening through Air India, under the government's Vande Bharat Mission. Singapore is going to open up its Vaccinated Travel Lanes (VTL) from November 29 for India and once the programme is in place, the vaccinated passengers will not be required to quarantine upon arrival, ANI reported. 

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Singapore is keen that Singapore airlines should resume partial operations in India. The talks for the recommencement of commercial flights between Singapore and India are moving in the right direction and there can be a decision soon, sources told the news agency. 

There is a huge pent-up demand from travellers from both countries. Technically, repatriation flights don't come under Singapore's VTL arrangement and only scheduled commercial flights are included in the said programme.

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Meanwhile, the External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, who is currently in Singapore, is holding discussions with the country's top leadership, and resumption of flights between the two nations also came up during his talks. 

On Wednesday, Jaishankar met the Singapore transport minister and discussed enhancing travel arrangement between the two sides.

"Began my Singapore visit by meeting S. Iswaran, Minister of Transport. Discussed enhancing travel arrangements between the two countries," Jaishankar tweeted.

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