No end to ordeal, Indians turned away from border

Tribune News Service

Aparna Banerji

Jalandhar, February 27

In the past two days, Akarsh Dingra, a 21-year-old business management student at Poltava, has walked 80 km, famished, sleepless and sick, in a desperate bid to find a border crossing. Having faced disappointment at Shehyni along the Polish territory, he’s now heading to the Slovakia border.

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New Delhi: A Sikh philanthropic organisation has said it will have relief teams on the ground in four European countries to assist those fleeing the war in Ukraine. Teams will be in place at Poland, Moldova, Slovakia and Romania, said the founder CEO of Khalsa Aid. TNS

Shivam Baweja (23), along with 200 Indian students, has been holed up in a bunker at a school near the Indian Embassy in Kyiv since February 24. These students made an attempt to head to the Romanian border last night, but couldn’t find a way out despite frantic calls to the nearby embassy.

Varun Kumar Harjai (31), a hotel management student at Poltava, is also trying to head to the Romanian border to find a way out of Ukraine — he got out on a drive this afternoon, after which his parents haven’t heard from him.

Blistered, hungry and thirsty, students are walking long distances and hitching rides in a bid to make it to a border crossing, but in vain.

Their parents say repeated attempts to contact the embassy have yielded no results as they haven’t heard from officials. With most students being denied passage at the borders, even as Ukrainians are allowed to cross over, disappointed students are running out of options as they have no money or food. At the Shehyni border checkpoint, thousands of Indian students braved a chilly night.

Rajesh Baweja, father of Shivam, claimed: “My son is stuck at a school near the embassy in Kyiv. Students are not getting any cooperation from the embassy. Indian students bound for flight from Kyiv on February 24 were dropped at the embassy after the invasion. They then took shelter at a nearby school. The embassy asked them to board a train for the Romanian border last evening. They went to the station, but the train left without them, as they had no tickets. Disappointed, they returned to the school.”

Baweja said while contact was established with a Sikh foundation to make food available, they needed transportation, which couldn’t be provided despite seeking help from the embassy. For now, some food had been provided by the embassy.

Akarsh, who hails from Kapurthala, didn’t sleep last night after getting blisters on his feet from walking 40 km from Lviv to Shehyni border checkpoint on the Polish border yesterday. His brother Saksham says: “At the border, Indians aren’t being allowed to cross over. Akarsh spent the night walking back to Lviv. The snow and sludge keep their boots and feet wet. Walking all night, they reached Lviv this morning. Now they want to go to Slovakia. How will they survive in this cold? The Slovakian border is their only hope.”

Congress MPs flag calls for help

Congress MP Partap Singh Bajwa, in his tweet to PM Narendra Modi and the EAM, flagged desperate calls for help by Indians stranded in Ukraine. The Indian Embassy was yet to reach out to them, he said. MP Gurjeet Singh Aujla lamented his mails to the Ukraine situation room had been put on auto reply. TNS

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