Flyers alert! Booked air ticket? You must know this important government decision before taking flight

In a major development, the Civil Aviation Ministry has told the airlines that passengers who submit a self-declaration form that they have not tested positive for COVID-19 during the three weeks prior to the departure date will be allowed to take their flight. On May 21, the government had made it mandatory for all passengers to submit the self-declaration form before a flight stating that they did not test positive for COVID-19 during two months prior to the departure date.

As there are a large number of people in India now who have recovered from the deadly virus, a need was felt to update the self-declaration form to avoid any hardships to them. Therefore, a few days back, the government told the airlines that passengers need to give a declaration that they have not tested positive for COVID-19 in the last three weeks prior to the flight, the officials said.

"Persons who have recovered from COVID-19 and who fulfil the three-week criteria will be allowed to travel by flights if they show a COVID-recovery or COVID-discharge certificate from their hospital," they mentioned.

India resumed domestic passengers flights from May 25 after a gap of two months due to the coronavirus pandemic. Scheduled international passenger flights continue to remain suspended in the country.

Meanwhile, India saw yet another record single-day jump of 28,701 COVID-19 cases, pushing its tally to 8,78,254 on Monday, while the death toll climbed to 23,174 with 500 people succumbing to the infection, according to the Union Health Ministry data. The number of recoveries stands at 5,53,470, while there are 3,01,609 active cases of coronavirus infection presently in the country and one person has migrated, the updated data at 8 am showed.

"Thus, around 63.01 per cent of patients have recovered so far," an official said.  The total number of confirmed cases includes foreigners. This was the fourth consecutive day that COVID-19 cases in the country have increased by more than 26,000. According to the ICMR, 1,18,06,256 samples had been tested for COVID-19 till July 12, of these 2,19,103 samples were tested on Sunday.