CHENNAI: Sakeer Aboobakkar's worst nightmare ended on Sunday. The 21-year-old was one of the five students from Tamil Nadu, the first among the 5,000 from the State stranded in Ukraine, to reach home.
The five students at Bukovinian State Medical University in Chernivtsi landed at the Chennai airport at around 10 am and were welcomed by their family and Non Resident Tamils Welfare minister KS Masthan. Eleven more students evacuated from Ukraine arrived in Chennai by late Sunday night in two batches.
Sakeer, who hails from Chennai, was speechless with relief on reaching Tamil Nadu safely. "Until I landed in India my heart was pounding," the first-year medical student said. Four of the five are in their first year and had gone to Ukraine in December.
Selvapriya Vivek, a native of Pudukkottai, also in her first year, said she was very lucky to be on the first list of students evacuated after the Russian invasion.
Amid explosions & shut airports, an eight-km walk out of Ukraine
Chernivtsi is in western Ukraine and is near Romania. Students said this region was less affected by the invasion. Sakeer said some of his Indian friends from the university on February 24, the day of the invasion, travelled to Kyiv airport by bus to catch flights home only to find the airport closed. It took them almost two days to return by bus, a journey that usually takes seven hours, as they dodged heavy shelling and explosions. Even the escape of the five was not easy.
"The college had arranged a bus for us to travel to Romania on Saturday but as so many people are fleeing Ukraine, there was a heavy rush at the border," said Harihara Sudhan, from Chennai. The students had to walk nearly 8 km to Romania.
"There was chaos and fear all around. There is a shortage of food at the stores and even ATMs are not functioning. People are desperately trying to cross the border. It is hard to describe this feeling. You could see the pain of having to leave their motherland writ on the faces of citizens," said Selvapriya.
She added exiting the country has now become harder. "Today, I spoke to my friends in Ukraine and they said it has become more difficult to reach Romania as shelling has started there too. I am grateful to the almighty that I was able to leave at the right time," she said.
The students and their parents have urged the State and Union governments to evacuate the other Tamil students stuck in Ukraine."Our friends are struggling to eat even one proper meal a day and have taken shelter in bunkers and metro stations. They should be evacuated before it worsens," said Vaishnavi, another rescued student.
Masthan said steps are being taken to evacuate the remaining students from Tamil Nadu. Meanwhile, for those who safely made it back, as Sakeer found, “a festival-like environment” awaits them at home.
Students flag shortage of food, money
"There was chaos and fear all around. There is a shortage of food at the stores and even ATMs are not functioning. People are desperately trying to cross the border," said a student