India-bound Ronak Sherasiya, an MBBS student in Ukraine, was meant to take a morning flight out of Kyiv on Thursday, but instead he is on his way back to his university in a bus, the sound of "multiple explosions" that he said he heard while exiting the airport, still echoing in his head. The 18-year-old native of Gujarat, a first year student at the Bukovinian State Medical University (BSMU) in Chernivtsi, a beautiful town in western Ukraine, about 500 km from capital Kyiv, said, "I had no idea that in a matter of few hours, the situation in Ukraine will take such a drastic turn".
"I and my friend and classmate Mahavir, also from Gujarat, were supposed to take a flight from Kyiv to Istanbul and then another flight from there to India. Our flight from Kyiv was scheduled to take off around 9 AM local time, so we had reached airport in the wee hours. Around 5 AM when we went to the counter for check-in, we were told that our flight had been cancelled," he told PTI over phone.
The MBBS student said, soon, airport authorities told me and other passengers to leave the airport, and stand at a distance of about 500 metre away from the airport building, Sherasiya said.
“After exiting airport, we heard sound of multiple explosions, and of sirens going off. We had not been following the latest news, and had no idea that Russia had launched an offensive against Ukraine, after several days of tension between the two countries,” he said.
Sherasiya, a native of Surendranagar district in Gujarat, said he had hoped that he and his friends would be able to leave the conflict-ridden country in time, before fate intervened.
“I was to go to India and see faces of my family members, but instead, I saw military tanks in the streets of Ukraine, and soldiers near them, from my bus,” he said.
Two other Gujarati students were to board a flight from Kyiv on Friday on way to India, but their flight also been cancelled, given the uncertain situation in Ukraine, and at the airport, said Krish Raj, another first year MBBS student at BSMU, who safely landed in Delhi late night on February 22.
“I reached my home at Surendranagar today, and tried to contact my friends who are still in Ukraine. I spoke to one of them on WhatsApp call today. I am just praying for their safety,” he said.
Movement of people is now difficult in Ukraine as it is under martial law and those hearing air sirens and bomb warnings should find nearby bomb shelters, the Indian embassy in Kyiv said in a fresh advisory to Indians there.
It said for those students who are stranded without a place of stay in Kyiv, the embassy is in touch with establishments to put them up.
Stating that his university was set up in 1944, in the middle of the World War II, Sherasiya said “wars and conflicts are never a solution to any issue”.
The Russian offensive followed weeks of escalating tensions between Ukraine and Russia, and on Monday, Russia had recognised the independence of two separatist regions in the eastern Ukraine — Donetsk and Luhansk.
On Tuesday, Indian embassy in Kyiv again had asked Indian students to temporarily leave the country amid the rising tensions.
Sherasiya said, all the passengers were spilled on to the streets after leaving Kyiv airport, and authorities later arranged transportation, and “we were dropped in front of a metro train station”.
“Our seniors helped us, and a bus carrying a group of BSMU students from India, whose flights were scheduled to take off in the afternoon (later cancelled), was on way to the airport. It was coordinating, using our WhatsApp group, and the same bus, in its way back, picked us up from the metro station,” he added.
“We are on the way back, and we saw, all shops shut, and many people with family carrying luggage, as if they were moving to safer place,” said Sherasiya, in the middle of his journey at 3 PM local time, adding, without traffic, it would take another nine hours to Chernivtsi. Mahavir Parmar, who is riding in another bus, with fellow university students, said, “We are fine as now, and we have told our parents to not panic”.
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