Council General of Pakistan in Dubai Ahmed Amjad Ali and other officials with a passenger at Dubai International Airport on Saturday. Supplied photo

Around 227 stranded Pakistanis from Dubai took the first special flight to Islamabad on Saturday evening.

The Pakistan International Airline (PIA) flight with 227 passengers, mostly from Dubai and Northern Emirates, were lucky to get seat confirmation earlier and boarded the flight which left Dubai around 7pm local time.

The government of Pakistan organised a number of special flights to bring back stranded Pakistanis from different countries around the world to the country. In this regard, the Pakistan's national carrier finalised various flights with the local ground authorities, including the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) in Pakistan and other bodies.

The Consulate General of Pakistan in Dubai confirmed to Gulf Today that it received requests from over 5,000 community members desperate to get back their homes after they either lost jobs or were asked to stay at home by their employers.

A Pakistani family at Dubai Airport.

According to media reports, many passengers complained about the exorbitant ticket prices for the one-way flight. Many said that they were forced to purchase tickets priced between Dhs1,800 to Dhs2,000 for the one-way flight from Dubai to Islamabad; in normal conditions the ticket would have cost around Dhs450 to Dhs700.

However, many appreciated the Pakistan government’s move to organise the special flights.

Shahid Mughal, the spokesperson of PIA in Dubai, told Gulf Today that they were facilitating the community members registered with the Consulate in the last couple of days. “On April 20, there will be four more flights – 2 from Dubai to Lahore and 2 from Dubai to Karachi – which will carry around 1,000 community members,” he said.

He also confirmed that the PIA operation was already taking shape with more special flights to bring Pakistanis back to their homeland: two flights from London and Manchester to Karachi were confirmed in the next 2-3 days.