Ukraine Crisis: Nitish Govt To Bring Home Students From Bihar On Its Own Expense

Deputy Chief Minister Tarkishore Prasad said that they have a list of about 273 students from Bihar stranded in Ukraine.

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar (File Photo: PTI)

New Delhi: As the stranded Indian students begin to arrive from Ukraine presently locked in a conflict with Russia, the Bihar government on Sunday announced to bring home the students from the state on its own expense.

Deputy Chief Minister Tarkishore Prasad said that they have a list of about 273 students from Bihar stranded in Ukraine.

“The number can go up. The Bihar government will bring them home on its expenses,” Prasad said, ANI reported.

“Teams of Bihar Foundation (in Mumbai) and Bihar Bhawan (in Delhi) are working on the students’ evacuation,” he added.

Meanwhile, Bihar Information and Public Relations and Water Resources Minister Sanjay Kumar Jha said the state government is coordinating with the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) in this regard.

“By today evening some students will be arriving from Budapest,” he added.

Meanwhile, the students from Bihar who returned to India expressed their delight to be back home.

“Happy to be back. Seeing the Indian flag, neither Ukrainians nor Russians would say anything, so it was a relief. The situation is grave there, some of our friends are living in bunkers,” one of the students said.

The Bihar government has also started helpline numbers for the boys and girls from the state who had gone to Ukraine for pursuing higher education.

The helpline numbers issued by the state Disaster Management Department are 0612-2294204, 0612-1070 and 7070290170, PTI reported.

The state government has also issued an email-id -- seoc-dmd@bihar.gov.in as evacuation of the Indian students trapped in Ukraine is picking up speed.

The Bihar Bhavan in New Delhi has also issued a helpline number -- 7217788114 and email-id -- rescm.bi@nic.in.

This comes as the students trapped in Ukraine are now anxious to make an exit in the wake of the crisis in the country.

In view of the escalating crisis in Ukraine, the MEA has also issued an advisory and urged the Indian nationals to avoid thronging border checkpoints “without prior information” because of obvious security risks.