On August 25, a charter flight of Air Arabia landed at Kathmandu’s Tribhuvan International Airport. Among the 161 passengers on board, 142 produced a negative polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test report conducted in the last 72 hours as per regulations. But 18 passengers provided rapid diagnostic test (RDT) results, which have not been authorised by the Nepal government, and one passenger did not produce any test report at all.
The Sharjah-based carrier arrived in Nepal in violation of the rules four days after the cabinet ordered that airlines should only board passengers with a negative PCR test report conducted in the last 72 hours.
Airlines have also been barred from bringing passengers with and without PCR test reports on the same flight.
A complaint was filed at the Civil Aviation Ministry as Air Arabia had violated the rule, and an investigation committee was formed. On Wednesday, the ministry ordered the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal to warn airlines not to make the same mistake again.
Air Arabia was made to pay the hotel quarantine charges of the 142 passengers carrying negative PCR test reports as a penalty.
Again on August 28, nine of the 148 passengers arriving on a Silk Air flight from Singapore were found not to have a PCR test report.
“As per government directives, we sent all the passengers to hotel quarantine. They will undergo PCR tests on Friday, and based on the test reports, they will be allowed to go to their respective destinations,” Nepal Army Spokesperson Brigadier General Santosh Ballav Paudel told the Post.
The Nepal Army has been tasked with checking arriving passengers and taking them to holding centres before sending them to their destinations. “The airline will pay all costs as per the government decision,” he said.
The issue does not end here. On Wednesday, a Nepal Airlines flight from Japan landed in Kathmandu at 5:30 pm with 115 passengers on board. Among them, two had test reports but they were in Japanese while another passenger had brought an RDT report, according to Paudel.
One passenger who was attached to a diplomatic mission was released as its responsibility, and nine others were sent to home quarantine on humanitarian grounds as they have come to Nepal due to family problems, according to Nepal Airlines.
“The rest were sent to hotel quarantine,” said Paudel.
An unnamed airport official told the Post that tensions ran high on Wednesday evening when all passengers started to scold the passenger with the RDT report.
“The female passenger carrying the RDT report was stressed after being rebuked by her fellow passengers since they all had to stay in a hotel for more than a week,” the official said. “But actually it was the airline’s mistake.”
That mistake cost Nepal Airlines nearly Rs1.5 million in hotel and PCR test charges.
Read More: Kathmandu Post