M R Sivaraman was Director General of Civil Aviation in 1990 and had submitted his enquiry report on the Airbus A320 crash in Bangalore in February 1990. The Airbus 320 aircraft had been grounded by the then government of V P Singh, who suspected corruption in the deal. Sivaraman had cleared the aircraft to fly, as Indian Airlines was incurring huge unsustainable losses.
Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait on 2 August 1990. Thousands of Indians working in Kuwait were in panic and naturally wanted to return home. They had moved to Dubai to take a flight back home. On or around 13 August 1990, Ganesan, Secretary, Department of Civil Aviation, telephoned Sivaraman around 10 am in his office and asked him to take an Airbus 320 to Kuwait from Mumbai and bring back the first batch of Indians. Ganesan asked Sivaraman to leave from the office straight to the airport so as to catch the flight departing from Mumbai immediately.
Sivaraman told Ganesan that he had no passport in his office or visa to enter Dubai. Ganesan told Sivaraman to stay on board and receive the Indians and assure them that he would take them home safely. Captain Deo was waiting for Sivaraman to take off to Dubai. That was the first passenger flight of the Airbus 320 after its crash in Bangalore.
In three hours, Sivaraman reached Dubai. Legally Sivaraman was an outlaw and an authorised stow away. Captain Deo entered the airport and informed Mascarenhas, Air India representative, that Sivaraman was on board, without any document, to accompany the first batch of Indians.
Mascarenhas, on being told that the DGCA India was on board, informed the DGCA Dubai, who immediately went to the aircraft and escorted Sivaraman into the airport where the milling Indians were there waiting to board the first flight home. Sivaraman addressed the first batch of Indians and assured all of them that they would be safely taken to India. Such an assurance was essential because some of the passengers might have been thinking that they were flying by an aircraft that had been grounded for about six months after a fatal accident.
Several hundred flights were arranged and 1,70,000 Indians were safely brought home. It was the largest air evacuation since the Berlin airlift during the Second World War, an exemplary achievement in the history of Indian aviation.
Prof V Suryanarayan, who was at that time associated with the University of Madras, was pleading through his speeches and writings that India should have made use of the opportunity to evacuate the stranded Bangladeshis, Sri Lankans and Nepalese. In a meeting in New Delhi, a senior official from the Government of India responded that by diverting the aircrafts, India was losing millions of rupees every day. Suryanarayan replied that the goodwill that India would have earned by such a timely gesture will far outweigh the financial losses.
New Delhi made amends when it assisted citizens of neighbouring countries when it undertook airlift operations in 2019 consequent to China shutting down its airports when the Covid outbreak took place.
Ukraine is a more difficult place than Kuwait and Dubai. But New Delhi should rise to the occasion and assist citizens of neighbouring countries too to return to their homeland. New Delhi should coordinate its air operations with those neighbouring countries and request the stranded people to assemble in one place. Road and air transport could be provided to them. Let us remember that a friend in need is a friend indeed.
The latest news from Ukraine does not give an optimistic picture of a return to peace. On March 1, an Indian medical student was killed when he went out to buy food and the Russian shells began to explode. According to Indian students who spoke to TV channels, there is no electricity, water has become scarce and food stocks are getting depleted.
The international community should rise to the occasion and compel the UN to airlift food, water and medicines so that the essentials of life are provided to the unfortunate people of Ukraine. On India’s part, its top priority should be to get a ceasefire declared by the warring sides so that all those who want to leave Ukraine could do so.
The international community can ill afford a deadly war that can spread to other parts of the world. Let not posterity judge that another chance for bringing about peace and reconciliation was missed by all sides. As Maya Angelou, the American poet, wrote a few years ago: “History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived. But if faced with courage, need not be lived again.”
MR Sivaraman, IAS (Retd)
Former Revenue Secretary, Government of India.
(Madras.Sivaraman@gmail.com)
(suryageeth@gmail.com)
V Suryanarayan
Senior Professor (Retd), University of Madras.
(V Suryanarayan was the Founding Director of the Centre for South and Southeast Asian Studies, University of Madras)