The Maharashtra government on Thursday revised its guidelines for international travellers a day after the Centre asked the state to “align” its rules with the SoPs announced by the Union Health Ministry. Maharashtra has now created another category — ultra risk — passengers from ‘at risk’ countries who will be sent to institutional quarantine.
The state has now mandated 7-day institutional quarantine and 7-day home quarantine for air passengers coming from high-risk countries — South Africa, Botswana and Zimbabwe. According to the revised order, the restrictions imposed by the Government of India guidelines from time to time shall act as minimum restrictions to be imposed on all international and domestic air passengers.
The order also states that ‘high-risk’ air passengers may be deplaned on priority and separate counters will be arranged by respective airport management authorities at all the international airports in the state for their screening and verification.
These passengers need to undergo an RT-PCR test immediately on their arrival at respective international airports, following which they must go for mandatory 7-day institutional quarantine. The second RT-PCR will be carried out on the seventh day. If any of the tests are found to be positive, then such high-risk air passengers will be shifted to a hospital. If the result of the Covid test on the 7th day comes negative, then such passengers will have to go for a further 7 days of home isolation.
For domestic passengers, they have to either carry their fully vaccinated certificate or mandatory RT-PCR negative test report of not more than 72 hours.
The revision in the travel guidelines came after Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan on Wednesday sent a letter to the Uddhav Thackeray government, urging it to align the orders with the Centre’s guidelines.
Reacting to it, government sources said that the letter has been taken into consideration, but the “processes take time as experts need to be consulted”. They added that the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has already deferred implementation.
Maharashtra had mandated RT-PCR testing of all international travellers at the Mumbai airport, irrespective of country of origin. It had also made it compulsory for all international passengers to undergo 14-day home quarantine, despite being tested RT-PCR negative upon arrival
In the letter sent to Maharashtra’s additional chief secretary, Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan advised that such modified orders of the state government are given wide publicity to obviate any inconvenience to travellers. Unlike Maharashtra, the guidelines issued by the Centre are meant only for ‘at-risk’ countries.
While no cases of Omicron have been reported so far in India, the Centre has advised states not to let their guard down and keep a strict vigil on the international passengers coming to the country through various airports, ports and land border crossings.
The BMC on Thursday said that no omicron had been found in Mumbai after the genome sequencing report of a traveller tested negative for omicron. Few more samples have been sent for genome sequencing. Their results will be out soon, it said.
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