Ukraine Crisis
PM Modi interacts with evacuated Indian students from war-hit Ukraine
Varanasi/IBNS: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday interacted with the students who had returned from war-hit Ukraine in Varanasi with the students narrating their experience in the war zone and the power of Indian tricolour that protected them on occasions while taking a perilous journey to reach bordering nations like Poland ahead of evacuation.
India's evacuation process in Ukraine named Operation Ganga, which began on Feb 22, has brought back over 6400 persons so far.
During the meeting with PM, students belonging to Varanasi and other parts of Uttar Pradesh shared their experiences, media reports said.
They thanked the Prime Minister and the Indian government for the evacuation efforts that helped them return from the conflict-hit Ukraine.
"Our parents were certain that PM Modi would do something to bring them back safe," said the students in their interaction with the PM.
PM Modi has been regularly holding high-level meetings to expedite the evacuation of stranded Indian nationals via neighbouring countries of Ukraine.
On Wednesday, he spoke on phone with Russian President Vladimir Putin to discuss the situation in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, where over a thousand Indian students are still stranded.
They discussed the safe evacuation of the Indian nationals from the conflict areas.
In the last 24 hours,15 flights have landed bringing back more than 3,000 Indians, the Ministry of External Affairs has informed.
Thursday’s flights included 5 from Bucharest, 2 from Budapest, 1 from Kosice, and 2 from Rzeszow by Civilian airlines.
In addition, 3 IAF flights are bringing more Indians between 11 pm on Thursday and the early morning of Friday.
#OperationGanga update
— Dr. S. Jaishankar (@DrSJaishankar) March 2, 2022
9 flights taken off today from Hungary, Romania, Slovakia and Poland. Includes IAF aircrafts.
6 flights more expected to depart shortly.
Altogether, will bring back more than 3000 Indian nationals. pic.twitter.com/gRQ58SvtNw
Four IAF flights have already brought 798 Indian nationals between midnight on Wednesday and the early morning on Thursday.
Over the next 24 hours, 18 more evacuation flights have been scheduled, including three of the Indian Air Force C17 Globemaster.
The rest are commercial flights, including Air India, IndiGo and GoFirst. Of these seven are to leave from Bucharest, five from Budapest, three from Poland, and the rest from Slovakia and Romania.
The number of civilian flights is being scaled up further, and more than 7400 persons are expected to be brought through special flights in the next two days. 3500 persons are expected to be brought back on Friday and over 3900 on Saturday.
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