{"id":320969,"date":"2020-03-11T18:23:09","date_gmt":"2020-03-11T18:23:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tehelka.com\/?p=320969"},"modified":"2020-03-11T18:23:57","modified_gmt":"2020-03-11T18:23:57","slug":"who-declares-coronavirus-a-global-pandemic-india-suspends-all-tourist-visas-till-april-15","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/who-declares-coronavirus-a-global-pandemic-india-suspends-all-tourist-visas-till-april-15\/","title":{"rendered":"WHO declares coronavirus a global pandemic, India suspends all tourist visas till April 15"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif;\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-320692 alignleft\" src=\"http:\/\/tehelka.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/virus.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"819\" height=\"446\" srcset=\"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/media\/2020\/03\/virus.jpg 819w, https:\/\/tehelka.com\/media\/2020\/03\/virus-300x163.jpg 300w, https:\/\/tehelka.com\/media\/2020\/03\/virus-768x418.jpg 768w, https:\/\/tehelka.com\/media\/2020\/03\/virus-696x379.jpg 696w, https:\/\/tehelka.com\/media\/2020\/03\/virus-771x420.jpg 771w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 819px) 100vw, 819px\" \/>World Health Organization (WHO) on Wednesday declared coronavirus a global pandemic. Looking at the rising cases of the coronavirus in the country, Indian government in a statement released informed that all existing visas, except diplomatic, official, UN\/International Organizations, employment, project visas, stand suspended till 15th April 2020. This will come into effect from 1200 GMT on 13<sup>th<\/sup>\u00a0March 2020 at the port of departure.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif;\">The government took the decision after detailed deliberations on preventive measures, actions taken and preparedness for Novel Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19).<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif;\">The statement further says,\u00a0 &#8220;Visa free travel facility granted to OCI card holders is kept in abeyance till April 15th 2020. This will come into effect from 1200 GMT on 13<sup>th<\/sup>\u00a0March 2020 at the port of departure.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif;\">&#8220;Any foreign national who intends to travel to India for compelling reason may contact the nearest Indian Mission.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif;\">&#8220;All incoming travellers, including Indian nationals, arriving from or having visited China, Italy, Iran, Republic of Korea, France, Spain and Germany after 15<sup>th<\/sup>\u00a0February, 2020 shall be quarantined for a minimum period of 14 days. This will come into effect from 1200 GMT on 13<sup>th<\/sup>\u00a0March 2020 at the port of departure.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif;\">&#8220;Incoming travellers, including Indian nationals, are advised to avoid non-essential travel and are informed that they can be quarantined for a minimum of 14 days on their arrival in India.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif;\">&#8220;Indian nationals are strongly advised to avoid all non-essential travel abroad. On their return, they can be subjected to quarantine for a minimum of 14 days.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif;\">&#8220;International traffic through land borders will be restricted to Designated check posts with robust screening facilities. These will be notified separately by M\/o Home Affairs.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif;\">Provision for testing primarily for students\/compassionate cases in Italy to be made and collection for samples to be organized accordingly.\u00a0 Those tested negative will be allowed to travel and will be quarantined on arrival in India for 14 days.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>World Health Organization (WHO) on Wednesday declared coronavirus a global pandemic. Looking at the rising cases of the coronavirus in the country, Indian government in a statement released informed that all existing visas, except diplomatic, official, UN\/International Organizations, employment, project visas, stand suspended till 15th April 2020. This will come into effect from 1200 GMT [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":320692,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[36],"tags":[12470,12753,11966,6737],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320969"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/users\/59"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=320969"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320969\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":320971,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320969\/revisions\/320971"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/media\/320692"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=320969"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=320969"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=320969"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}