Ukraine: Police misbehaved with Indian students as they pushed elderly, says VK Singh in Lok Sabha

The students were stuck in a 25-km-long jam and there was no way to cross the road to the other side as a large number of Ukrainians were trying to cross over to Poland, VK Singh said.
MoS Civil Aviation VK Singh (Photo | ANI)
MoS Civil Aviation VK Singh (Photo | ANI)

NEW DELHI: Union minister V K Singh on Tuesday told Lok Sabha that police at Ukraine's border crossings misbehaved with Indian students as they pushed the elderly to move ahead and not because New Delhi abstained at the UN.

Intervening in a discussion on 'situation in Ukraine', he noted that during the course of the discussion in the House, it was said that Indian students had to walk long distances.

They were stuck in a 25-km-long jam and there was no way to cross the road to the other side as a large number of Ukrainians were trying to cross over to Poland, Singh said.

"In a 25-km-long jam, you will have to walk. Air plane will not come. Drone will not come there. If there was inconvenience nothing could have been done about it at that time" he said.

"We made efforts that embassy personnel could provide them with blankets, sent food, all...they were there for two-three days. All efforts were made. There is an expectation that we should be received in vehicles and escorted across the border," he said.

"Similarly, there was a mention that there was misbehaviour by the police. There was crowd at border crossings. But the way our mindset (manosthiti) is nobody wants to maintain discipline, form a queue. And where they pushed the elderly, the police misbehaved with them...We checked it personally everywhere and wherever there was misbehaviour with our students, it did not happen because we abstained (at the UN), it happened because our students were trying to move ahead by pushing the elderly" he said.

He said there are several things on which a misconception is formed his aim was to correct this.

Singh said some students who returned without anyone's help were neither sad nor unhappy.

Whatever India did has not been done by any other country, Singh, who was a special envoy sent to the bordering countries of Ukraine to coordinate the evacuation of Indians, said.

Referring to Harjot Singh, the Indian student injured in the war-torn country, the minister said while his ambulance was stuck in a jam and was running out of fuel, the Indian defence attache and the personnel managed to provide the vehicle with gasoline with great effort.

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