Parliament Proceedings | 4.5 million Indians brought back home during pandemic: Jaishankar

India carried out the largest repatriation process in the history of the world bringing home more than 4.5 million nationals under the Vande Bharat Mission during the pandemic, said External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar on Monday in Parliament. Updating both the Houses, he praised the diplomatic initiatives of the government behind the exercise and said there are problems of ‘compensation’ and ‘re-employment’ that remain for the Indians who lost their jobs in the Gulf countries and other places during the last year.

“This was an all of the government effort, involving the Ministries of External Affairs, Civil Aviation, Home Affairs, Health, Defence and Shipping, among others. 45,82,043 people from 98 countries have returned under the aegis of the Vande Bharat Mission,” said Mr. Jaishankar who highlighted Kerala which received the maximum returnees. Other prominent centres that received large number of returnees included, Delhi, Maharashtra, and Tamil Nadu.