About 11 lakh stranded Indians have returned from abroad through ‘Vande Bharat Mission’ evacuation mission since it’s launch on May 7 amid the coronavirus pandemic, The Ministry of External Affairs announced on Tuesday.

Spokesperson Anurag Srivastava and Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri took to twitter to inform about crossing the 10 lakh (One million) mark. The images showed countries from where the Indians were evacuated.

‘Driven by the aspirations of our people, the mission continues to facilitate repatriation and outbound travel of stranded and distressed citizens,’ Puri tweeted.

#VandeBharatMission crosses the 1 million mark!!We continue our efforts with @MoCA_GoI, MHA, @MoHFW_INDIA to bring our nationals home. https://t.co/OjTEPmQHvf

— Anurag Srivastava (@MEAIndia) August 11, 2020

At present, phase 5 of the mission is underway and is expected to repatriate more than 1,30,000 Indians stranded abroad.

Earlier, Puri had informed about the negotiations that India is carrying out with 13 countries including Australia, Italy and Japan to establish bilateral air bubble arrangements for flight operations.

The arrangement helps airlines to operate international flights with certain restrictions. As of now, India has established air bubbles arrangements with the US, UK, France, Germany, UAE, Qatar, and the Maldives.

The negotiations are underway with Australia, Italy, Japan, New Zealand, Nigeria, Bahrain, Israel, Kenya, Philippines, Russia, Singapore, South Korea and Thailand.

We continue to further strengthen the reach & scope of VBM. Air Travel arrangements are already in place with USA, UK, France, Germany, UAE, Qatar & Maldives. We are now taking these efforts forward & are negotiating with 13 more countries to establish such arrangements.

— Hardeep Singh Puri (@HardeepSPuri) August 18, 2020

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