‘Stranded in India’ app to help tourists

nNEWDELHI: A French woman, who had landed in Rishikesh two months ago to enter an ashram, missed the news of India’s 21-day lockdown as she had decided to stay off news alerts and internet.

But on Wednesday, as she found out about it, a local told her to try the tourism ministry. She filed a request, and by Thursday, she was on a bus to Delhi. A relief flight to France is slated for the coming week. She filed a complaint on a portal the Centre had launched on March 31. The tourism ministry said it received 500 queries and requests for help since the launch. The ministry had launched a portal on March 31, ‘Stranded in India’. The ministry said its task force dealing with the complaints said most of the queries were about information for travelling back home, about extension of visas, and the logistics of travelling within India .

Tourism ministry officials said they are coordinating with the ministry of external affairs, embassies as well as state officials to help stranded tourists.

Director General (Tourism) Meenakshi Sharma said the ministry’s regional offices and state governments have intervened and involved local hotels in these states. Tourism ministry officials said anywhere between 3000-4000 foreign tourists have been stranded in India. Most of them are from the United States, Italy, United Kingdom and Eastern Europe.

A flight to Finland and another to Germany left with around 650 passengers from Goa, and in the coming days Italy and France are sending flights for tourists stranded from their own countries. From Delhi and Mumbai, four flights took off for Frankfurt this week, and flights to the US are slated later this week.