West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Friday questioned the Centre's decision to ban international flights from March 22 in view of novel coronavirus outbreak and asserted that the action of banning the flights should be implemented immediately.
"Why should international flights be shut from 22nd March? This needs to be done immediately, we said this at the conference (Prime Minister's video-conference with Chief Ministers)," Banerjee said in a press conference here.
Earlier in the day, the West Bengal Chief Minister attended the video-conference meeting called by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to discuss measures to tackle the deadly virus.
Amid coronavirus pandemic, the central government has banned the operations of international commercial passenger flights in India from March 22 to March 29.
The circular was issued by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) on Thursday."No scheduled international commercial passenger aircraft shall take off from any foreign airport to land in India, from March 22, 2020 (05:30 hrs IST). These instructions shall remain in force till March 29, 2020," read the circular.
The total number of COVID-19 cases in India has now climbed up to 223, including 32 foreigners, the Union Health Ministry said on Friday.