Kochi, May 9 (PTI)Woman power came to the fore as the massive exercise to evacuate Indian citizens stranded abroad in various countries continued on Saturday with two flights to Malaysia and Oman being helmed by women.

Two women-Captain Kavitha Rajkumar and Captain Bindhu Sebastian- commanded the Air India Express flights operated today from Tiruchirapalli and Kochi to Kuala Lumpur and Muscat respectively to bring back Indians stuck there due to the lockdown in place to contain the COVID-19 spread.

Today was the third day of the repatriation exercise -'Vande Bharat Mission'.

WhileCaptain Kavitha Rajkumar is commanding IX 682/681 on Tiruchirappalli-Kuala Lumpur, Captain Bindhu Sebastian is the commander of IX 443/442 on Kochi-Muscat- Kochi flight.

While the Tiruchirapalli-Kuala Lumpur flight took off at 01.11 pm, the Kochi-Muscat flight took off at 01.17 pm.

"I am extremely proud of being part of this evacuation mission," Captain Bindu Sebastian said in a video shared by an Air India Express official here.

The flights are expected to return with evacuated Indian citizens on Saturday night.PTI TGB SS

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)