'A Sigh Of Relief': 700 Indians Evacuated From Ukraine's Sumy May Board Flight Home On Thursday

The last group of about 700 Indian students evacuated from the northeastern Ukrainian city of Sumy has boarded a special train from Poltava and are probably going to get onto a flight to India from Poland on Thursday.

New Delhi: Amidst the ongoing war between Ukraine and Russia, 700 Indian students were evacuated from the northeastern Ukrainian city Sumy in 12 buses on Tuesday and are likely to board a flight to India from Poland on Thursday.

The arrangements for buses to evacuate 700 Indian students trapped in Sumy were also done with great difficulty. Three teams of Indian officials and local embassy staff were stationed in three different cities. The embassy official said that after facing several challenges, the buses finally managed to reach Sumy.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's phone calls to Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky played an important role in the evacuation of the students. Amidst heavy shelling and firing in Sumy, these students had sent SOS videos but the Indian authorities were unable to arrange a safe passage for them. These students had said in the video that the food and water near them were running out, even they had threatened to leave the city on their own if there was no arrangement from the government.

The last group of about 700 Indian students evacuated from the northeastern Ukrainian city of Sumy has boarded a special train from Poltava and are probably going to get onto a flight to India from Poland on Thursday.

The train will take the students to Lviv in western Ukraine, from where they will be taken to Poland in buses, Anshad Ali, a student coordinator, informed.

The distance between Poltava and Lviv is around 888 km.

Covering many miles across Ukraine, utilizing numerous methods for transport, the students are being evacuated from the conflict-hit east European country after their two weeks of horrifying stay in beleaguered Sumy.

The Indian government is completing a most fragile and testing clearing exercise under Operation Ganga to assist abandoned Indians with leaving Ukraine.

The operation in Sumy started on Tuesday morning when the last enormous gathering of around 700 Indians was evacuated from the city.

The Indian nationals were taken from Sumy in a convoy of 13 buses accompanied by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to Poltava city, Ali said.

The students are persevering through an exhausting excursion to get away from the conflict-hit region. This is the second attempt to evacuate students from Sumy, which has been seeing intense fire ever since a Russian offensive on Ukraine began last month.

Jisna Jiji, a 25-year-old clinical student said she and other students are calm to have emerged from Sumy.

"We are tired but happy. We are travelling since Tuesday morning and have to travel for several more hours but now, we have hope that we will reach home safely," she said as quoted by PTI.

Ali, who spoke to PTI from Poltava, said it is an almost 12-hour train journey to Lviv, from where the students will be taken to Poland through buses.

Lviv is located about 50 km from the Poland border.

After crossing the frontier, the students will be flown out on evacuation flights from Poland.

"The students left Sumy at around 9:30 am. First, they reached Poltava, which is 170 km away and then they boarded a train to Lviv," Ali said.

"From Lviv, they will be taken to Poland in buses and then they are expected to board a flight for India on Thursday," he added.

Ali informed that nearly 700 Indians were moved out of the city. The group also included a handful of Bangladeshi and Nepalese nationals, he noted.

"After the Indian students, the students of other countries were also evacuated. Around 95 per cent of the students have been evacuated from Sumy," he informed.

For two weeks, the Indian students in Sumy pursued a daring fight in bomb shelters and basements of their hostels in a cold climate, coming up short on food, drinking water, and other fundamental supplies, as Russian powers bludgeoned the city with rockets and heavy gunfire.
 
The first attempt to evacuate them was made on March 7 after the distressed students put out a video, saying they have decided to take a journey on foot to reach the Russian border. The attempt failed as the ceasefire did not take hold and the students were made to return to their hostels.

The Indian embassy in Ukraine has issued an advisory, urging all stranded Indian nationals to make use of the "humanitarian corridor" and leave the country using trains, vehicles, or any other available means of transport, keeping in mind their safety.

Considering the security situation, the establishment of the next humanitarian corridor is uncertain, the advisory said.

"All stranded Indian nationals are urged to make use of this opportunity and evacuate using trains or vehicles or any other available means of transport, giving due consideration to safety," it said.

(With PTI inputs)