About 3000 Indians had been safely evacuated from Sudan by Monday (May 1, 2023) morning. ..reports Asian Lite News
A little over a year ago, India evacuated 17,000 Indian nationals from Ukraine under Operation Ganga, after Russia launched a military operation against the country in late February 2022. This April, as news of the armed conflict between the Sudanese Army and the paramilitary’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF) came in, India set its sights on ensuring the safety of its nationals in the war-torn north African country.
On April 21, Prime Minister Narendra Modi directed the preparation of contingency evacuation plans. Three days later, on April 24, Operation Kaveri was launched to engulf the 3,500-odd Indians in Sudan with a safety blanket and airlift them swiftly to the Indian shores.
About 3000 Indians had been safely evacuated from Sudan by Monday (May 1, 2023) morning. The stark photograph of the IAF C-130J flight carrying the 16th batch of evacuees taking off from Port Sudan – with 122 Indians including women and children packed like sardines – en route to Jeddah will remain in our memories for a long time to come. By Friday (May 3, 2023) afternoon, five more batches of Indian nationals had been evacuated from Sudan.
The first batch of 360 Indians from crisis-hit Sudan arrived in New Delhi on April 26, two days after Operation Kaveri was launched. “India welcomes back its own. #OperationKaveri brings 360 Indian Nationals to the homeland as first flight reaches New Delhi,” tweeted External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, along with arrival pictures. The evacuation operations were swiftly carried out when the warring factions in Sudan agreed to a 72-hour ceasefire on April 25.
Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport reverberated with slogans of ‘Bharat Mata Ki Jai’ as Indians stepped onto the aerobridge. The image of a middle-aged man with a backpack touching the ground as he stepped out of the flight summed up Operation Kaveri aptly. Similar were the scenes as a crew of the Indian Navy’s INS Teg cradled a baby while embarking on the rest of the evacuees on board the mission.
INS Sumedha sailing from the Port of Sudan to Jeddah was also on the same mission, only with little more emotional quotient. Indians from Sudan aboard this ship tweeted about how the tune of Vande Mataram played on the deck filled their hearts with love and reassured them that India stood for Indians stranded in Sudan.
Rivers, like mothers who embrace their children and transport them to safety, protect the humanity that depends on them. That is why the top rescue missions of India – Operation Ganga and Operation Kaveri – have been named after rivers. Just like the river of south India, Operation Kaveri is fast, fierce and fearless. The other one that comes to our mind is Operation Devi Shakti, a mission by the Indian Armed Forces to evacuate Indian citizens and foreign nationals from Afghanistan after the collapse of the ruling dispensation of Afghanistan and the fall of Kabul, the capital city, to the Taliban.
For Operation Kaveri, C-130 J aircraft of the Indian Air Force were mobilized and positioned in Jeddah as early as April 19. In the coming days, three ships of the Indian Navy – INS Sumedha, INS Teg, and INS Tarkash – would dock at Port Sudan, roughly 850 kilometres from capital Khartoum that has seen fierce fighting and where most Indian nationals were located.
Under Operation Kaveri, the Indian mission in Sudanese capital Khartoum organised buses to transport Indian nationals to Port Sudan. From here, they left for Jeddah in Saudi Arabia where a transit facility had been set up. They were moved out in batches, using the Indian Navy ships and the Indian Air Force transport aircraft. One batch, including family members of Indian Embassy personnel, was flown out of the Wadi Seidna air base in the vicinity of Khartoum.
Minister of State for External Affairs V Muraleedharan camped in Jeddah to supervise the execution of Operation Kaveri, under which the evacuated Indian nationals were then flown to cities in India, including New Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, and Kochi.
“There’s a full triangulation of efforts between (the) control room in Jeddah through our Consulate and Mission in Riyadh, through the control room team in Port Sudan, which is the north-eastern coast of Sudan and our Embassy in Khartoum city,” Foreign Secretary Vinay Kwatra had said at a special media briefing in New Delhi on Thursday (April 27, 2023).
Since April 15, 2023, clashes between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary’s RSF have killed at least 450 people and injured 4,000, according to estimates cited by the World Health Organisation (WHO).
22nd batch of 135 Indians departs from Port Sudan
Under Operation Kaveri, the 22nd batch with 135 stranded Indian evacuees have left on IAF C-130J aircraft from war-torn Sudan for Saudi Arabia’s Jeddah.
“22nd batch of evacuees leaves Port Sudan. 135 passengers are flying to Jeddah onboard IAF C-130J aircraft,” Ministry of External Affairs Spokesperson Arindam Bagchi tweeted on Thursday.
Earlier on Wednesday, 62 Indian nationals reached New Delhi.
The two warring factions in Sudan, the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) agreed to a seven-day ceasefire, according to a statement from the foreign ministry of South Sudan on Tuesday.
In a telephonic conversation with South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir Mayardit, the warring parties agreed to the seven-day truce from May 4 to 11.
“The two principals, General Abdel Fatah Al Burhan, the Chairman of the Sovereign Council and Commander in Chief of Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) and General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo Leader of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), have agreed in principle for a seven-day truce from May 4th to 11th. They also agreed to name their representatives to the talks,” the statement read.
In the telephone conversation, South Sudan’s President stressed the importance of a longer ceasefire and naming of representatives to peace talks to be held at an agreed venue.
Neither SAF nor RSF commented on the report on their official channels.
Previous ceasefires haven’t been able to put an end to the violence between the opposing factions across the nation. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, the commander of the Sudanese army, and Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, the leader of the RSF, failed to reach an agreement, and in the middle of April, there were violent skirmishes between the two sides that resulted in at least 528 deaths and large-scale migration of refugees from the country, CNN reported.
Tuesday’s announcement came after the UN’s refugee agency (UNHCR) warned that more than 800,000 people may migrate to other nations as continuous violence impedes convoys to evacuate people from Sudan’s major ports. (ANI)