Air sirens part of life, nearly 1,500 Indian students still in Ukraine: Malayali doctor
He is currently on a short visit to his ancestral house at Edappally.
'Air sirens have become a part of our lives. As they sound, we will all go to the underground shelters. The country has an underground metro system and the stations will be packed with people when the air sirens go off,' Menon said at the Changampuzha Park as part of a talk on 'Devastation Due to War: A First-Hand Account'.
While most of the foreign citizens have fled the country, many foreign students pursuing higher education have returned, he said.
'There are now only around 50 Indians continuing to reside in the country. However, there are nearly 1,500 Indian students. The medical course there is of six years. Those who were studying up to third or fourth year courses have migrated to universities in other countries like Georgia. But the students in the final year semesters (5 and 6) have returned and are studying in universities located close to eastern Europe,' he said.
Menon is set to return to Ukraine on July 19. Having settled down in Kyiv, Ukraine's capital, he is running a medical consultancy there.
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India has maintained regulatory carve-outs in sensitive areas such as legal practice, taxation, and national security, and full mutual recognition of professional qualifications remains limited. In contrast, the UK's offer on services is more cautious, with limited liberalization beyond select areas such as computer services, consultancy, and environmental services. 'The UK has allowed an annual quota of 1,800 temporary visas for roles like yoga instructors and classical musicians, but has not made binding commitments on broader mobility categories such as business visitors or IT professionals," said Ajay Srivastava, founder of Global Trade Research Initiative (GTRI), a think tank. 'The UK's decision not to restore post-study work visas also remains a point of contention for Indian students, as the agreement does not override the UK's existing points-based immigration system," he said. 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