Coronavirus impact: Visa ban set to hit charter tourist arrivals in Goa

The coronavirus scare has abruptly cut short the charter tourism season in Goa midway with visas for international travellers getting suspended from March 13 midnight onwards.

India on Wednesday suspended all visas, except a few categories such as diplomatic and employment, till April 15 in a bid to contain the spread of novel coronavirus. The suspension will come into effect from March 13 midnight.

With this, the already struggling state tourism industry is staring at huge losses as it depends on foreign travellers to a large extent for revenue generation.

Goa Airport Director Gagan Malik said the actual situation on chartered flights, which bring tourists to the state, will be clear only in the wee hours of March 14.

Those who are flying before 5.30 am of March 14 will be allowed to enter in the country. But considering the current situation, it looks difficult that any charters will come now, he said.

Malik said the airport was expecting 60-70 more chartered flights to arrive till end of the May, when tourist season ends.

Now, empty charters will arrive to take back the tourists to their destinations in the days to come, he said.

 

Travel and Tourism Association of Goa President Savio Messiah said the chartered season will come to an early end with the ban on visas.

We want to approach the government seeking exemption for Russian travellers from the visa ban. Russia is not affected by the coronavirus, he said.

But it looks unlikely that the Centre will listen to the request as scare is widespread. We have to look at the issue from broader perspective, he added.

During the last tourist season, 250 chartered flights had arrived from different countries, including Russia and the UK. The collapse of travel firm Thomas Cook in the UK last year had severely affected chartered flights to Goa.