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New Delhi, May 7: Air India has opened bookings for eligible foreign nationals and valid visa holders of the UK, the USA and Singapore for outbound repatriation flights that will be operated between May 7 and May 14 under the Vande Bharat mission, officials said.

Foreign nationals or valid visa holders will be charged the same fare as Indian nationals who want a seat on the inbound repatriation flights, they said.

For all flights between India and the USA under the Vande Bharat mission, Air India is charging a fixed fare of Rs 1 lakh per passenger.

For flights between India and Singapore, the charge is Rs 18,000-20,000 per passenger, and it is Rs 50,000 per person for India-UK flights.

On Tuesday, the Ministry of Home Affairs had clarified that a person who has an Overseas Indian Citizenship (OCI) card, or citizenship of a foreign country, or a valid visa of more than one year of that country, or the green card of that country can travel on repatriation flights leaving India under the Vande Bharat mission.

Air India will be conducting 64 flights to 12 countries between May 7 and May 13 to bring back approximately 15,000 Indians stranded due to the coronavirus-induced lockdown, Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri had announced on Tuesday.

However, some flights have been delayed and therefore, this set of 64 flights will be operated between May 7 and May 14, the airline officials said.

On Wednesday, an Indian businessman and his cook landed at Delhi airport from Lusaka in Zambia in a plane that was supposed to come without any passengers, senior government officials said.

The private chartered aircraft was scheduled to come empty and take around 40 Zambian nationals to Lusaka in a repatriation flight, they added.

"We had not permitted any incoming passengers. We will seek explanation from the airline (private operator) as to how it happened. BOI (Bureau of Immigration) has a very stringent protocol for dealing with such deviations, which must have been acted upon," said a senior official of aviation regulator DGCA.

It is not clear if the businessman and his cook were deported or sent to a quarantine facility within India.

India has been under a lockdown since March 25 to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus. All scheduled commercial passenger flights have been suspended during the lockdown.

However, cargo flights, medical evacuation flights and special flights permitted by Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) have been allowed to operate during this time.

New Delhi, May 13: Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday announced Rs 3 lakh crore collateral-free automatic loan for businesses, including MSMEs.

This will benefit 45 lakh small businesses, she said detailing parts of the Rs 20 lakh crore economic stimulus package.

The loan will have 4-year tenure and will have a 12-month moratorium, she said.

Also, Rs 20,000 crore subordinated debt will be provided for stressed MSMEs, she said adding this would benefit 2 lakh such businesses.

The Finance Minister said a fund of funds for MSME is being created, which will infuse Rs 50,000 crore equity in MSMEs with growth potentials.

Also, MSME definition has been changed to allow units with investment up to Rs 1 crore to be called micro-units in place of Rs 25 lakh now.

Also units with turnover up to Rs 5 crore to be called micro-units, she said, adding a turnover based criteria is being introduced to define small businesses.

The investment and turnover limits for small and medium businesses have likewise been raised to allow them to retain fiscal and other benefits, she said.

Global tenders will be banned for government procurement up to Rs 200 crore, she said, adding this would help MSMEs to compete and supply in government tenders.

New Delhi, Mar 4: A court in Delhi on Wednesday convicted expelled BJP MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar of culpable homicide not amounting to murder in the death of the Unnao rape victim's father.

District judge Dharmesh Sharma said Sengar had no intention of killing the victim's father. “He was beaten in a brutal manner that led to his death,” the judge said.

The court had sent Sengar to jail on December 20 for the “remainder of his natural biological life” for raping the woman in 2017, when she was a minor.

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had examined 55 witnesses in support of the case and the defence examined nine witnesses.

The court had recorded the statements of the rape survivor's uncle, mother, sister and one of her father's colleague who claimed to be an eyewitness to the incident.

Charges were framed against Sengar, his brother Atul, Bhadauria, sub-inspector Kamta Prasad, constable Amir Khan and six others in the case.

The case was transferred to Delhi from a trial court in Uttar Pradesh on the directions of the Supreme Court on August 1 last year.

In July, 2019 a truck rammed into the car the rape victim was travelling in with some family members and her lawyer.

Two of her aunts died in the incident. She was airlifted from a hospital in Lucknow and to AIIMS in Delhi.

The victim has been provided accommodation in Delhi and is under CRPF protection.