By Sanjana Udiaver and Radhika Sarkar
Direct flights between Kathmandu and Bangladesh have been cancelled. Travel agencies selling tours to Sri Lanka have suffered losses.
The US-Bangla plane crash in Kathmandu yesterday and the state of emergency in parts of Sri Lanka have disrupted scores of people’s travel plans.
Flights from India have been delayed and direct flights to Kathmandu from Bangladesh have been cancelled following the US-Bangla Airlines plane crash in Kathmandu yesterday killing 49 people.
Masud, executive of central reservation of US-Bangla Airlines, said that all flights to Kathmandu from Bangladesh have been cancelled. The airline has not received any updates from Kathmandu, which could take around 15 days.
There have been delays in Jet Airways flights from Bangalore to Kathmandu via Mumbai by 40 minutes. The Delhi-Kathmandu flight was delayed by 30 minutes.
However, some flights travelling from Bangalore to Kathmandu have not faced much trouble. Radheesh, associate from Indigo Airlines, said that the connecting flights from Bangalore to Kathmandu via Delhi have been on time without any delay or cancellation.
Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal (CAAN) said that a press conference is being held with regard to the incident.
Dirgha Raj Prasai, former MP of Nepal, stated this was a regrettable incident.
The frequency of flights from Bangladesh to Kathmandu is one per day which departs from Dhaka at 12.30 PM.
Sri-Lanka is facing an emergency for ten days that is disrupting travel and vacation plans all over, causing a loss of revenue for travel agents. The 10-day emergency at Si Lanka is caused because of communal violence and is disrupting business and travel plans in the city.
Mr Koshy, director of 7C holidays said “The travel agencies are more of less prepared, because the incidents have become very common. We usually provide them with alternate destinations when issues like this happen. “The alternate destinations that are provided to them are Thailand, Mauritius and Bhutan. Mr Koshy further stated that “There is a loss that obviously occurs during that period of time. We put in all our efforts from our tourist organisation to curb this problem. “
The communal violence is having a direct effect on the travel and tourism sector and is causing a loss of revenue. It is also affecting business trips to Sri-Lanka.
Ms Soundarya, another travel agent at Riya travels, said that “The government of Sri-Lanka do not advertise the place properly, but still foreign tourists go and visit the place. “ India is a major source of foreign tourists to Sri-Lanka and because of the communal violence people are not able to go to the destination.
The Indian carriers like Indigo that regularly fly to the destination’s capital have waived off the cancellation fee for passengers booked to fly in and out of Colombo for that period of time.
The Indian Association of Tour Operators has said “These situations keep happening and nothing can be done about it. We have to wait till the situation is under control. “The state of emergency in Sri-Lanka forced tourists and travel agents to cancel the bookings and make other travel plans.
