A special Air India flight from Kerala’s Kochi on Saturday morning, took a total of 112 French nationals, stuck in the state since the 21-day lockdown began to arrest the flow of Coronavirus pandemic.

The special Air India flight arrived from Bengaluru with passengers and  took off at  08:13 today from Cochin international airport. The flight will go to Mumbai and then depart for Paris, where more of them are waiting to travel to France.

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Similar flights were operated to ferry German and Omani nationals from the state in the past few days. These people came  to the state either as tourists or for health checkups and ayurveda treatments and got stuck here due to the flights cancellation because of the lockdown.

Cochin airport officials expressed their intent that they are ready to do similar operations to fly out other nationals who are stuck in the state.

In Kerala, nine fresh cases of infection were reported on Friday, seven from Kasargod district and one each from Thrissur and Kannur. Out of the 295 confirmed cases in the state till date, 251 are currently under treatment in various hospitals. At least 206 had come from abroad, seven are foreign nationals  who came here as tourists and 78 are primary contacts of infected persons.

Meanwhile, Chief Minister  Pinarayi Vijayan has announced the formation of a 17-member task force  to recommend a return to normalcy from lockdown in a phased manner. The task force would be headed by former chief secretary KM Abraham as convenor, reported  The Hindu.

Earlier, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had asked the state governments to suggest as to how to go work around the stage after the lockdown ends.

India on Saturday recorded the highest single-day jump with 601 cases of Coronavirus in the past 24 hours, taking the total tally to 2,902 including 68 deaths.

Meanwhile, the Centre has identified 14 hotspots across the country, where the maximum number of cases are detected. Dilshad Garden, Nizamuddin, Noida, Bhilwara, Kasargod, Pathanamthitta, Kannur, Mumbai, Pune, Indore, Jabalpur, Ahmedabad, Ladakh and Yavatmal are listed as COVID-19 hotspots.