At least 10,800 Indians have been brought back by special flights from Ukraine’s neighbouring countries under Operation Ganga, the Centre said on Friday. The evacuation process was carried out by three Indian Air Force C-17 aircraft and 14 civilian flights, with one more civilian flight expected to arrive later today.
Meanwhile, two Russian IL-76 strategic lift planes are on standby to fly out to Moscow as soon as Indian nationals evacuated from northeastern cities of Kharkiv and Sumi are taken to the Russian capital.
The ministry said that one more civilian flight is expected to arrive later in the day. While Civilian flights carried 3142 persons, C-17 flights evacuated 630 passengers. So far, over 9364 Indians have been evacuated by 43 special civilian flights.
A total of 7 flights of C-17 have so far evacuated 1428 passengers and taken 9.7 tonnes of relief material.
“Today’s civilian flights included 4 from Bucharest, 2 from Kosice, 4 from Budapest, 3 from Rzeszow and 2 from Suceava, while IAF flew 2 flights from Bucharest and 1 from Budapest,” it said.
The ministry informed that tomorrow, 11 special civilian flights are expected to bring back more than 2200 Indians, with 10 landing in New Delhi and one in Mumbai.
Apart from that, 5 flights will originate from Budapest, 2 from Rzeszow and 4 from Suceava. Four C-17 aircraft are airborne for Romania, Poland and Slovakia, which are expected to reach late at night and early morning tomorrow.
(With inputs from agencies)
