Hyderabad: The first flight of “Vande Bharat Mission” to lift the stranded Indian nationals in Kuwait landed on Saturday late night at Rajiv Gandhi International airport at Shamshabad.

The airbus Air 320, AI- 988 that departed at 3.26 pm from Kuwait with 163 passengers on board touched down at the city facility around 10.30 pm from there, the passengers were ferried to quarantine centres identified by the Government. The Government made arrangements of quarantine centres in Hyderabad about six or seven star hotels for the stranded passengers, being brought to Hyderabad from various countries will be kept for 14 days, said officials.

The passengers are being provided this facility at a nominal rate. Those who are unable to pay for the hotels were accommodated for free of cost in Government hospitals. There are three categories of paid quarantine, the least of them of Rs. 5K has been removed and instead free quarantine has been assured for workers arriving from the Gulf depending on their financial status. According to the airport sources all safety precautions were adhered to while facilitating the movement of passengers.

All arriving passengers and aircraft crew were escorted out of the aircraft in batches of 20- 25 people. Each passenger was screened by the thermal cameras positioned at the aero bridge exit by airport health officials as per the directives of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare prior to immigration formalities. The entire airport was sanitized, including the conveyer belt and trollies. Social distancing was maintained at every step.