Evacuation is on in west Ukraine, students stranded in east want to be lifted through Russia
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New Delhi: Nearly 500 Indian students have been stranded in Sumy, a town situated in eastern Ukraine two hours away from Russian border, have urged the Indian authority in Moscow to evacuate them through Russia.
In their appeal to the authority, they have narrated the difficult situation in which they are into, where reaching the western Ukraine to join the Indian evacuation mission is not possible. Indian evacuation efforts are now focusing on the western Ukraine.
The students stated that the 20-hour journey to the western Ukraine is risky, since train tracks are damaged and landmines have been planted on the roads at least up to Kyiv.
Students have sent a video request to the Indian embassy officials in Moscow, considering them to be rescued through Russia.
Sumy is around 200 km away from Kharkiv, which faced the brunt of Russian attack on Tuesday. An Indian student died in the shelling. With the Russian military action set to intensify in the coming days, the students say they are in a desperate situation.
Students have also said that they are spending nights in the bunker in college because of frequent shelling amid the food and water shortage.
While India has planned to operate 26 flights to evacuate citizens over the next three days, all of these will take off from nations sharing a border with Ukraine in the west.
Under the "Mission Ganga" plans, there are 46 flights till March 8, of which 29 will take off from Bucharest, 10 from Budapest, six from Poland's Rzeszow, and one from Slovakia's Kocise. The Air Force will operate one flight from Bucharest.