80 flights deployed to evacuate Indians from Ukraine

In a bid to further scale up the evacuation efforts, the government has deployed 80 flights under 'Operation Ganga' to evacuate stranded Indians from Ukraine.

IMAGE: Indian nationals arrive from war-torn Ukraine after being evacuated by Indian Air Force's C-17 aircraft at Hindan Air Force Station in Ghaziabad on March 3, 2022. Photograph: Rahul Singh/ANI Photo

The government has also roped in more than two dozen ministers to monitor evacuation missions without any hiccups, sources told ANI on Thursday.

Sources told ANI that the government has accelerated the evacuation plan for the Indians stranded in Ukraine.

Total flights ferry has been increased to bring more and more Indians.

By March 10, a total of 80 flights will be pressed into service to evacuate the stranded Indians.

These flights belong to the fleet of Air India, Air India Express, IndiGo, Spice Jet, Vistara, Go Air, and also planes from the Indian Air Force.

Sources also told ANI that the 35 evacuations have been planned from the Romanian capital city Bucharest, which include 14 flights of Air India, eight of Air India Express, seven of IndiGo, one of Spice Jet, three of Vistara and two of Indian Air Force.

A total of 28 flights have been scheduled to take off from Hungary's capital Budapest. Among these 28, 15 flights are from Go Air, 9 from IndiGo, 2 from Air India, 1 from Indian Air Force, and 1 from Spice Jet. A total of nine flights are scheduled from Rzeszow, Poland, which includes eight from IndiGo and 1 from Indian Air Force, while five flights will take off from Suceava, Romania and 3 flights will take off from Kosice, Slovakia.

Sources also stated that approximately 17,000 stranded Indians will be evacuated from Ukraine by these 80 flights, scheduled to take off from Budapest, Bucharest, and Rzeszow, Suceava, and Kosice.

Till March 2, a total of 24 flights have landed under 'Operation Ganga'. The government started 'Operation Ganga' on February 26 to evacuate stranded Indians from Ukraine.

The first flight carrying Indians landed in Mumbai on February 26 which was received by Piyush Goyal, Minister for Commerce and Industry, Textile, Consumer Affairs, Food, and Public Distribution.

Prime Minister has sent four ministers Jyotiraditya Scindia, Hardeep Singh Puri, Kiren Rijiju, and VK Singh to Hungary, Romania, Slovakia, and Poland to oversee the evacuation of Indians.

The Modi government has also roped in ministers to monitor smooth evacuation and receive Indians at Delhi and Mumbai Airport who are coming from Hungary, Romania, Slovakia, and Poland under Operation Ganga.

Union ministers Jitendra Singh, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, Rao Inderjeet Singh, Narayan Rane, G Kishan Reddy, Kailash Choudhary, Parshottam Rupala, Bhagwant Khuba, Virendra Kumar, Meenakshi Lekhi, V. Muraleedharan, Bhagwat Karad, Nisith Pramanik, Shantanu Thakur, Rao Saheb Danve, Darshana Jardosh, Devusinh Chauhan, Bharati Pravin Pawar, Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti, Bhanu Pratap Singh Verma, Subhas Sarkar, Kapil Patil have been assigned to receive the flights coming from neighboring countries of Ukraine carrying Indians.