Ukraine invasion
26 flights over next 3 days to evacuate stranded Indians from war-hit Ukraine: Centre
New Delhi/IBNS: India will operate 26 flights over the next three days to fly back Indian citizens who have moved from Ukraine to neighbouring countries, Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla informed reporters on Tuesday after Prime Minister Narendra Modi chaired a meeting on the country's evacuation efforts called 'Operation Ganga'.
Besides Romania's Bucharest and Hungary's Budapest, airports in Poland and Slovak Republic will also be used for the evacuation efforts, he added.
There were an estimated 20,000 Indian students in Ukraine when the government issued its first advisory.
"From that number, approximately 12,000 have since left Ukraine, which is 60 per cent of the total," he said.
"Of the remaining 40 per cent, roughly half remain in the conflict zone in Kharkiv, Sumy area and the other half has either reached the western borders of Ukraine or are heading towards the western part of Ukraine... they are generally out of conflict areas," Shringla said.
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The government had stepped up its evacuation efforts over the last two days as videos from stranded students flooded social media.
PM Modi held four high-level meetings within 48 hours.
A dedicated Twitter handle was started to aid the students and the services of Air India was augmented by private carriers Spicejet and Indigo.
As many as 182 Indian citizens from Ukraine have been brought back to India, by the seventh evacuation flight as part of the Government of India’s Operation Ganga, officials said on Tuesday.
"All of our nationals have left Kyiv," Shringla informed the media personnel.
"The information with us is that we have no more nationals left in Kyiv, nobody has contacted us from Kyiv since... All our inquiries reveal that each and every one of our nationals has come out of Kyiv," he added.
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