Helpdesk shut, wait gets longer for stranded Indians
Kolkata: While Bengal residents continued to return homes from West Asia on Wednesday, troubles are far from over for those still stranded in the two warring nations of Israel and Iran as the Indian embassy in Tehran has shut its helpdesk at Mashhad.
They have been checked into Sadr Hotel in Mashhad for two more days after which they are likely to make return arrangements on their own.
Sayantan Maiti, a Barrackpore resident and a post-doctoral research fellow at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, crossed Israel through the Egypt border on Tuesday. "While many were being evacuated through Jordan, another group was sent back home through the Egypt border.
The strikes on the US airbase led to the temporary shutdown of the airspace by a number of countries," he said.
Maiti, who started from Haifa on Tuesday, reached Egypt by the afternoon. In the past two days, the Indian embassy in Tel Aviv picked up students from different locations and took them to the borders of Jordan and Egypt. "When we started on Tuesday, there were frequent siren alerts for missile attacks. While we were on our way to the Egypt border, news flashed that Iranian missiles hit the Be'er Sheva area," recounted Maiti.
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The buses were halted, and the drivers waited for instructions from the Indian embassy. "We were anticipating further escalation of conflict. Fortunately, a ceasefire was declared. From Eilat, the southernmost point of Israel, the Indian embassy in Egypt took over our responsibility," he recounted.
Twenty pilgrims from North 24 Parganas, who were evacuated from Mashhad, reached Kolkata past Tuesday midnight. "They were happy to come back home. The Indian embassy in Iran took good care of them. But for my parents, who went on a pilgrimage to Iran and went through the most difficult phase of their lives, the scars will continue to haunt them," said Hossain Mehedi, whose parents returned to Kolkata on Tuesday.
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