Ukraine crisis: Over 2K Indians to be brought back on Sunday

New Delhi, March 5 (IANS) Over 2,000 Indian nationals are expected to be evacuated under 'Operation Ganga' from the borders of war-torn Ukraine on Sunday.

The Centre has initiated an airlift operation to evacuate Indian nationals, who have found their way to the neighbouring countries of war-torn Ukraine. It has deployed a number of special charter flights as well as Indian Air Force aircraft to ferry back Indian citizens.

"Tomorrow (Sunday), 11 special flights are expected to operate from Budapest, Kosice, Rzeszow and Bucharest, bringing more than 2,200 Indians back home," a statement issued by the Ministry of Civil Aviation said.

"Under Operation Ganga, about 3,000 Indians have been airlifted on Saturday by 15 special flights from Ukraine's neighbouring countries," it added.

According to the statement, Saturday's operations were conducted via 12 special civilian and 3 IAF flights.

The civilian flights were operated from Budapest, Suceva, Kosice and Rzeszow.

"With this, more than 13,700 Indians have been brought back since the special flight operations began on February 22," the statement said.

Besides, the ministry said that 11,728 Indians have been brought back by 55 special civilian flights.

Till date, the IAF has flown 10 sorties to bring back 2,056 passengers, besides taking 26 tonnes of relief load to the Ukraine's neghbouring countries as part of Operation Ganga.

"Three IAF C-17 heavy lift transport aircraft, which had taken off from the Hindon air base on Friday, landed back on Saturday morning. These flights evacuated 629 Indian nationals from Romania, Slovakia and Poland. These flights also carried 16.5 tonnes of relief load from India to these countries," a statement said.