New Delhi: After a prolonged gap of about two years, the centre finally gave the approval to resume all international flights in India.

The restriction was imposed on the operation of all regular international flights owing to the Covid pandemic.

It may be noted that for the last two years, international flights were operating in an "air bubble" arrangement with several nations due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Under "air bubble"  agreements, the number of flights was restricted to some 2,000 a week. Due to this the prices of international fights had gone too high.

Now, after the permission, no less than 60 airlines from 40 countries can fly to India during the summer schedule, which will be from March 27till October 29 this year.

Meanwhile, the experts in trade are happy with the development, which they also expect will help in slashing down air ticket costs.

The permission to resume all international flights may help in bringing down airfare, but the ongoing Ukraine war may be a spoiler as the war has resulted in a significant rise in the crude oil prices in the international market.

Fuel prices have risen steeply in the last month since Russia launched a military operation in Ukraine.

"Every time capacity is increased, airfares do head downwards. The only complicating factor this time is the war in Ukraine which is resulting in oil prices spiking," says Sanjiv Kapoor, incoming CEO at Jet Airways.

Some reports suggest that flight-related searches have increased on the internet after the lifting of curbs on flight movements.

 "Consumer sentiment is very positive right now. International flights opening up is welcome news. Our recent survey suggests an all-time high in people wanting to travel," says Aloke Bajpai, the co-founder of travel portal Ixigo.

MakeMyTrip group CEO Rajesh Magow echoes the sentiment saying that there has been a 40 per cent increase in month-on-month searches. "The dampener still is the fares due to the war," says  Magow.