'Global flyers may not be required to upload vax certificate on Suvidha'

The government is actively considering doing away with a provision which requires international passengers to upload their Covid vaccine certificate or RT-PCR negative report on the Air Suvidha portal before flying to India.

However, the existing mandate of filling up a self-declaration form online on the portal will continue, official sources told PTI.

Passengers have been complaining about the portal being periodically down, difficulty in accessing forms and uploading of certificates, the sources said, adding the removal of the provision may come as a relief for them.

"The Civil Aviation Ministry recently sought inputs from the Union Health Ministry for removing the provision which requires international passengers to upload the COVID-19 vaccine certificate or the RT-PCR negative report on the Air Suvidha portal citing inconvenience faced by travellers," a source said.

"The health ministry has given its go ahead," the source added.

The aviation ministry has been receiving feedback from travellers about the hassles they face while uploading the certificates prior to their travel.

With international travel getting back to the pre-pandemic level, several countries have taken steps to relax requirements and restrictions for ease of travel, they said.

India logged 12,751 new coronavirus infections taking the country's total tally of COVID-19 cases to 4,41,74,650, while the active cases have declined to 1,31,807, according to the Union health ministry data updated on Tuesday.

The death toll has climbed to 5,26,772 with 42 fatalities which includes 10 reconciled by Kerala, the data updated at 8 am stated.