Airlines Deals

A total of 342 Indians, evacuated from the trouble-torn Lebanon, arrived in Chennai on Friday night by a special Air India flight from Larnaca, Cyprus.

Majority of the passengers who arrived by the Boeing 747-400, were from Tamil Nadu. Ten of them were Keralites.

Union Minister of State for External Affairs Vyalar Ravi, who received the Indian nationals, told reporters that the process of evacuation of Indians from Lebanon would continue and whoever reported to the Indian Emabassy at Beirut would be be airlifted.

Tamil Nadu ministers M R K Paneerselvam and Thangam Thennarasu were also present at the airport.

Altogether 602 Indians were airlifted back home from Larnaca in Cyprus after their evacuation from Lebanon and 400 more were awaiting a chance to leave the trouble-torn country at the earliest.

Soon after the evacuees reached Larnaca from Beirut by Naval warship INS Mumbai this morning, they were put on board two special Air India planes to be brought to Mumbai and Chennai, External Affairs Ministry Spokesman Navtej Sarna told reporters here.

The evacuees included six Nepalese and some nationals from a few other countries, he said.

Indian Ambassador to Lebanon Nengbha Lahovum said over phone from Beirut that requests had been received from 400 more people and another evacuation by sea could take place after two days as paperwork had to be completed.

Three Naval warships — INS Brahmaputra, INS Shakti and INS Betwa — are anchored off the Beirut coast and once the people are ready to leave, one of the vessels will be called in to ferry them to Larnaca, she said.

Those evacuated in the first sortie of Indian Navy`s `Operation Sukoon` included 441 people from Tamil Nadu, 42 from Maharashtra, 53 from Delhi and 10 from Kerala.