Australia will resume repatriation flights for some citizens in India after a controversial ban on arrivals from the country ends on 15 May.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison has faced criticism for failing to help citizens trapped in the Covid-ravaged nation.
The ban sparked further anger after the government said Australians seeking to fly home could face jail or fines. Mr Morrison later played down this threat.
On Friday, he said they would begin by bringing back "vulnerable" citizens.
About 900 Australians are registered with the government in this group. More than 9,000 Australians are in India in total.
Mr Morrison said he expects the travel ban to end on 15 May. However, his government will wait until next week to make a decision on whether to restart commercial flights from India, which is how most stranded Australians will be able to get home.
Even then, many fear they may find it difficult to secure a seat on a flight, or afford the costly fares.
Why can't Australians get back into their country?
The India restrictions, which began on 27 April, led to the cancellation of two official evacuation flights that week. The ban's wider impact has also been heavily criticised.
The tough measures were introduced due to India's escalating Covid crisis. The country is seeing more than 300,000 cases reported each day and hospitals continue to run out of oxygen.
Meanwhile Australia's Trade Minister, Dan Tehan, has said the country's borders may not fully reopen until the middle or second half of 2022. Speaking to Sky News, Mr Tehan said he was hopeful that more travel corridors would be opened, like the one between Australia and New Zealand.
Who will get to fly back first from India?
Mr Morrison said the government was planning three repatriation flights in the second half of May, which would bring back Australians who have registered as "vulnerable".
That group may grow. As the situation in India worsened in the week since the travel ban was announced, the number of vulnerable Australians jumped from 600 people to 900.
India Covid aid 'not reaching those in need'
Evacuees will be taken to the Howard Springs quarantine facility in the Northern Territory, which will be expanded to provide 2,000 beds by next week.
Australia initially justified the ban by arguing the high rate of infections seen in arrivals from India was putting the quarantine system under stress.
The faults in Australia's hotel quarantine
But on Friday, Mr Morrison said the ban had worked to reduce the number of cases in quarantine "back to more manageable levels".
"[We] will be at a level by 15 May to ensure, that as planned, we will be able to return to having those repatriation flights from India."
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How has the public reacted?
While Australians have been largely supportive of the government's strict border policies over the past year, the India travel ban sparked significant outcry.
Public anger fixated on the idea that the government had left its citizens in danger, and would punish them if they attempted to return.
Critics - including legal and medical experts - accused the government of abandoning its people.
Many Indian-Australians, among others, also argued the government had enacted a "racist" policy given similarly harsh restrictions weren't applied to arrivals from other high-risk nations.
One prominent voice, cricketer-turned-commentator Michael Slater, wrote a popular tweet accusing the prime minister of having "blood on your hands".
"Take your private jet and come and witness dead bodies on the street," Slater wrote in another tweet.
He was one of about 40 Australians in India for the Indian Premier League cricket competition which was suspended this week.
Cricket Australia announced on Wednesday that the remaining cricketers had been moved out of the country, and would get a chartered flight home after the ban is lifted.
Australia has enjoyed near-zero infection rates due to strict border and quarantine controls, and contact-tracing measures. Sydney recorded two new local cases this week, prompting authorities to reimpose mask-wearing rules and limits on group gatherings.
Australian citizen Mandeep Sharma has been deserted by his government.
He is one of the 9,000 Australians stranded in India, left to fend for themselves after Canberra this week banned all flights from the Covid-ravaged nation until mid-May.
Mr Sharma has a wife and two daughters in Adelaide. He travelled to India last month to attend his father's funeral and was due to fly back next week.
Now he fears contracting the virus and being separated from his family indefinitely.
On Saturday, Australia also announced it would jail anyone who attempts to return from India. For people like Mr Sharma, trying to get home is now a criminal act - punishable by five years jail or an A$66,000 (£36,800; $51,000) fine.
It's just the latest hardline action taken by the government to keep the virus out of the country. Australia has enjoyed near zero- infection rates and recorded just 910 deaths - far fewer than most other nations.
It attributes its virus success to its strict border controls and quarantine measures. But these have also locked out thousands of Australians from returning home over the course of the pandemic.
The India ban also marks an extraordinary escalation - the first time the country has made it a crime for its own citizens to return home.
Why can't citizens get in?
Australia was one of the first nations to close its borders in March 2020, barring all arrivals except returning nationals, residents, and people granted exemptions (including celebrities, sports stars and contract workers). Since October 2020, it has also allowed travellers from virus-free New Zealand.
All arrivals are forced to undertake - and fund - a two week quarantine stay at at a hotel, typically in a state capital city.
Currently, around 36,000 nationals are registered for government help to fly home, a level that has remained consistent over the past year. Prior to the pandemic, there were estimated to be about one million Australians living overseas.
Early on in the quarantine programme, a problem emerged. The number of people returning home - mostly from New Zealand, the US and the UK - threatened to overwhelm the system. There were only so many hotel rooms available.
So the government looked for a solution. Instead of expanding the system - for example, adding a purpose-built quarantine centre - authorities drastically cut back the number of plane arrivals allowed in each week.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison initially sold the "travel caps" as a temporary limit. But the cap has become a permanent fixture.
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Currently about 7,000 people are allowed in each week. But the level can be reduced at any time - causing flight cancellations and route changes. In January, it was halved due to community outbreaks and virus mutations.
Many stranded Australians say they would be happy if they felt like they were joining an ordered queue to get home. But the system has proven chaotic and arbitrary, and lacks measures to prioritise those most in need.
That means who gets to go home essentially comes down to the commercial airlines. The limit on arrivals into Australia has driven up airfares, pushing them out of reach for many.
It has led to the current situation, where less than half of those arriving in Australia in February were citizens.
The government has organised a number of repatriation flights, but getting a seat is highly competitive. They're also not free.
Is hotel quarantine adequate?
Increasingly, no. Since the more infectious UK variant arrived in Australia, it's tested the quarantine system.
Perth endured a three-day lockdown last week after the virus leaked out of one of the hotels. This marked the seventh time since November that an Australian city has plunged into a snap lockdown due to a quarantine leak.
In the past six months, Australia has seen 16 breaches of its hotel quarantine system as more infectious strains have come in. Breaches include transmission between travellers in separate rooms, and infections passed onto workers.
Despite efforts to fix hotel quarantine, including improving air circulation and safety protocols, the virus keeps getting out.
Why a 'world-class' quarantine has seen failures
Still, the 16 breaches are few compared to the system's overall success. More than half a million people have been processed through hotel quarantine, says Mr Morrison.
But each breach is a risk to the community, and the recent examples have sparked alarm about the suitability of quarantining people in city hotels.
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How could quarantine be improved?
Critics have demanded a system overhaul to allow more Australians to come home. State governments, tired of having to plunge cities into lockdown, have called for federal government to help build more appropriate facilities.
Experts have consistently suggested that travellers be moved out of city hotels and into purpose-built centres in regional areas.
Many point to the success of the Howard Springs centre, a refurbished mining camp near Darwin. Instead of people being quarantined in cramped hotel rooms with shared corridors, they stay in single-unit houses with outdoor spaces. The centre will be expanded from 800 beds to 2,000 next week.
On Thursday, the state of Victoria announced it would begin work on designing a similar facility because "we need options that we can take up to make the community safer".
"It is clear the virus will be with us for some time," said Acting Premier James Merlino, who also mentioned Australia's delayed vaccine rollout.
But the new quarantine centre will need federal buy-in. He called on Canberra to stump up the A$100m (£56m; $78m) investment needed to build the centre by the end of the year.
Experts have also suggested the alternative of home quarantine, which has been a success in places like Taiwan and Singapore.
