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Domestic flights resumed operations on a truncated schedule on Monday with the first aircraft departing from the Delhi Airport for Pune, more than two months after a nationwide lockdown was announced to combat COVID-19.

The first flight to take off was an IndiGo aircraft to Pune, flying passengers stranded in the national capital since the lockdown was announced on March 24.

Passengers were screened at the airport with electronic thermometers, and revised protocol for air travel that included santisation of luggage through ultra-violent scanners, and maintaining physical distancing.

Only asymptomatic passengers were allowed to enter the airport.

Passengers were also seen wearing face masks and face shields given to them at the embarkation point by the airline to minimise the chances of infection while onboard.

The first flight arrived at Delhi Airport from Ahmedabad – a SpiceJet aircraft – at around 8:00 am.

BJD Lok Sabha member Anubhav Mohanty was among those who took the Air Vistara flight to Bhubaneshwar that departed Delhi airport at 6:50 am.

The first flight to take off from Mumbai was an IndiGo aircraft that departed for Patna at 6:45 am, while passengers from Lucknow were the first to reach the financial capital on an IndiGo aircraft that touched down at 8:20 am.

The food & beverage and retail outlets, which were closed for the past 63 days, opened at Terminal 3 of Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International (IGI) Airport.

The flight services resumed after a day of long and hard negotiations between the Centre and the states on Sunday.

All states finally agreed to accept at least some flights but announced different quarantine and self-isolation rules for arriving passengers to address apprehension about infections being brought in from other cities.

The Centre had issued guidelines for all modes of domestic travel that advised all asymptomatic passengers to self-monitor their health parameters for 14 days on completion of the journey and report to health authorities if they displayed any symptoms for COVID-19.

However, the Centre had allowed state governments to prescribe their own health protocols for disembarking passengers which led to differential guidelines across the country.

New Delhi, Mar 19: Hit hard by coronavirus, budget carrier IndiGo today announced that it will cut salaries of senior employees. IndiGo CEO Ronojoy Dutta, who will himself take a 25% cut in salary, said senior vice presidents and above are taking a 20% pay cut while vice presidents and cockpit crew are taking a 15% pay cut.

With precipitous drop in revenues, the very survival of airline industry is now at stake, Dutta said while announcing the pay cut. "We have to pay careful attention to our cash flow so that we do not run out of cash," Dutta said adding that he knew how hard it was for families to take a cut in "take-home pay".

"With a great deal of reluctance and a deep sense of regret, we are therefore instituting pay cuts for all employees, excluding Bands A and B, starting April 1, 2020," the chief executive officer said. Band A and B are the lowest brackets in salary class, where most of the employees are.

IndiGo's flight operations chief Ashim Mitra had written an email to pilots this morning saying that the economic environment has deteriorated significantly and no airline is insulated from this severe downturn.

"It has become a necessity to initiate some tough calls and we are working on a string of measures that will be shared and implemented over the next few days and weeks," Mitra said.

With countries sealing their borders partially or fully across the world due to the novel coronavirus pandemic, aviation sector has been hit extremely hard as most airlines globally have drastically curtailed their flight operations.

Another budget airline GoAir has already terminated contracts of expat pilots amid curtailed operations due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Citing "unprecedented" decline in air travel, the budget carrier announced it was suspending international operations and offering leave without pay programme to its staff on a rotational basis.

Government-owned Air India may also cut salary of employees by 5% amid its growing financial woes particularly in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, which has nearly grounded its entire international operations. The reduction will be across the board, according to a PTI report.

The loss-making airline, which is in the process of a second attempt of privatization after failing to get a single buyer nearly two years ago, has already taken some steps such as reduced flying allowances to cabin crew besides withdrawing entertainment allowance to executive pilots, among others.

“Air India is considering a 5 per cent pay cut to its employees as it faces huge financial crisis due to the ongoing coronavirus outbreak, which has brought almost its entire international operations save the US, Canada and a few other markets, to the ground," a source told news agency.

Jan 31: President Ram Nath Kovind on Friday hailed the contentious Citizenship Amendment Act as "historic" in his address to joint sitting of both houses of Parliament, prompting protests by some opposition members.

He also said that debate and discussion on any issue strengthens democracy while violence during protests weaken it.

"The Citizenship Amendment Act is a historic law. It has fulfilled wishes of our founding fathers including Mahatma Gandhi," he said.

"Debate and discussions strengthen democracy, but violence during protests weaken democracy," he said without directly referring to the anti-CAA protests in the country some of which have witnessed violence.

In a reference to abrogation of Article 370, Kovind said there is happiness among people of India that people in Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh have got rights on par with the rest of the country.

The president said Parliament has created record in the first seven months of the new government headed by Narendra Modi by enacting several landmark legislations.

"My government is taking strong steps for making this decade as India's decade and this century as India's century," he said.