Not yet time to 'pawri': Aviation minister Hardeep Singh Puri on Covid-19 rise

Mar 21,2021

Restrictions like night curfews and lockdowns have been imposed in several parts of India as many states are hit by the second wave of Covid-19.
Civil aviation minister Hardeep Singh Puri on Saturday joined in the latest 'pawri' trend, begun by a Pakistani social media influencer, as he said restrictions are necessary in some regions that are seeing a surge in the Covid-19 cases. And so are mandatory RT-PCR tests, the minister added.
Restrictions like night curfews and lockdowns have been imposed in several parts of India as many states are hit by the second wave of Covid-19. Amid this, the minister added that the number of domestic fliers is holding steady as more than 2.47 lakh passengers flew domestically through 2,330 flights on March 19, more than 26.3 million fliers since May 25.

"With rising Covid-19 cases in some regions necessitating restrictions & imposition of compulsory RT-PCR tests, it's not yet time to #pawri. But the number of domestic fliers is holding steady. 2,47,037 fliers on 2,330 flights on 19 March 2021. More than 26.3 million fliers since 25 May," the minister tweeted on Saturday.
The domestic flight operations in the country were stopped from midnight of March 24 last year in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. The flight operations resumed on May 25 starting with a lower capacity.

Puri also shared more statistics pertaining to the recovery of domestic aviation operations. As per the tweet, the domestic flight operations are growing steadily towards the pre-Covid levels. Overall flight movements on March 19 were reported to be 4,663 with total footfall at the airport surpassing over 4.96 lakh, the data shared by the aviation minister showed.

The domestic flight operations reached the highest since its resumption on May 25, 2020. on February 28, when more than 3.13 lakh domestic passengers flew through 2,353 flights.
The aviation industry has been hit hard with the raging coronavirus pandemic and re-imposition of restrictions all around the world. The optimism brought in by the vaccine rollout may get washed out with the new waves, variants of the virus with the International Air Transport Association (IATA) predicting the risk of an increased number of bankruptcies.

The minister's tweet to be careful and not party or 'pawri' comes as India on Sunday recorded the highest single-day spike of the year by reporting more than 43,000 cases in the last 24 hours.