Government's decision on planning charter flights for Kiwis stranded in India has brought hope in altogether unexpected quarters - the Indians stranded in New Zealand.
The Indian Weekender has spoken to many such Indians stranded in NZ who are hoping that charter flights potentially going to Mumbai or New Delhi could also ferry them back home - an overly ambitious expectation - however not completely unreasonable though.
To be clear, evacuating stranded Indian citizens from NZ back to India is by no means a responsibility, or a priority, of the Kiwi government, which is rightly focussed on working on solutions that can get their own citizens back home.
The responsibility of evacuating stranded Indian citizens from NZ lies explicitly with their government back in New Delhi, and it's clear that jaded travellers are mixing two different political issues and oversimplifying things in their imaginations.
To be also clear, there is no comparison between the complexity and the scale of challenges facing India and New Zealand in evacuating their respective stranded citizens from different parts of the world amidst Covid-19 related global lockdown.
However, that harsh political reality is not stopping stranded travellers from being hopeful of an early return back home.
Evacuation of Kiwis stranded in India and Indians in NZ are two different issues
The two governments - NZ & India - have expectedly different perspectives and different logistical challenges to worry about, before committing to a clearly complex plan of evacuation of its citizens.
NZ government's endeavours to get Kiwis stranded in India back home was largely operational, with logistical challenges, which includes negotiating through different closed international air-routes, permission for refuelling facilities, bearing and distributing the costs of charter flights, on top of getting permission from New Delhi for the entry of aircraft in the Indian ports.
Sanjay Kumar Shroff with his wife Jyotsna Shroff and another couple Mr and Mrs Sunil Tellakula (Photos Supplied to IWK)
On the other hand, the Indian government is constrained by a policy challenge - of enunciating an evacuation plan for all Indian citizens stranded in different countries around the world, which could easily be in hundreds of thousands posing an unprecedented logistical challenge not only in arranging for flights but more importantly for organising post-arrival quarantine facilities, and any lapse there could easily defeat the entire purpose of the nation-wide lockdown.
Any one-off concession to allow stranded Indians from NZ would have to fit-in their wider policy response to the crisis affecting Indians stranded in other countries around the world.
Indeed these are not easy decisions to make, even without the normal diplomatic complexities involved.
Why can Indian govt make a one-off concession for travellers from NZ?
Despite the seemingly insurmountable logistical challenges, there is a clear case for the Indian government to consider a one-off concession for its citizens stranded in NZ.
As of today, NZ, by all means, is one of the safest places on the earth to not only have flattened the curve of the spread of coronavirus infection, but the rate of infections is fast dwindling and rate of recovery is slowly increasing.
Indeed, NZ's daily statistics of coronavirus infections is one of the most soothing, and without any sense of exaggeration, much assuaging, for the rest of the world.
Travellers Neerav and Bindiya who were on their honeymoon before getting stranded in NZ (Image: Supplied)
So any evacuation of Indian citizens who were stranded in New Zealand will give the Indian authorities much-needed assurance and the confidence in handling their on-arrival health check-up and even self-isolation if needed.
This is apart from the immense goodwill that the Indian government will earn for bringing its people back home, who are not only jaded by the long, uncertain wait in a foreign country but also experiencing pain and anxiety of being separated from their near and dear ones who are negotiating through the lockdown alone by themselves.
In many cases that the Indian Weekender has been made aware about the personal situation of the stranded Indian travellers in NZ, the concern for the safety of either minor children or adult family members back home during the lockdown is a paramount concern behind their calls for early evacuation home.
What's in it for the NZ government?
Clearly, there is no additional responsibility of the NZ govt towards Indian travellers stranded here, except what it has already been kindly extended, in the form of an assurance of unconditional medical care in the unfortunate event of being infected from coronavirus.
However, if some kind of quid-pro travel arrangement be materialised, courtesy to some diplomatic ingenuity from both New Delhi and Wellington, the burden of some of the operational challenges could be reduced and mutually-shared, plus the biggest incentive of reducing the per-passenger costs of the otherwise expensive travel for stranded Kiwis.
The government has suggested that the charter flights to India will operate on the model of similar-such operation to Peru where stranded Kiwi-travellers will be expected to bear some or the entire costs.
Expectedly, this news has been received by many stranded Kiwis in India with subdued-caution rather than unbridled-enthusiasm, for the simple reason that for many working families the cumulative costs will be prohibitive.
It was reported in several media stories that returning Kiwis from Peru had to bear a whopping cost of $6000 per ticket to get on the plane to home.
A quid-pro travel arrangement could easily bring down the prohibitive costs on many stranded Kiwis in India.
Is some creative diplomacy in order here?
Against this backdrop, it is for the diplomats of the two countries to do some groundwork and present a workable plan to their respective governments which can not help get their respective citizens home but also generate a never-seen-before bonhomie for each other countries in their respective capitals.
It is truly an ambitious project never ever anticipated before in the bilateral relations of the two countries.
Kharag Singh is one of the members of the public who is currently stranded in India with his 95-year-old father
But so is the world of complete lockdown that we all have suddenly found ourselves living in recent times.
Unprecedented challenges often precipitate unprecedented solutions.
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