Cheers, tears of joy as 1st batch of Indians returns from Sudan

Yadav said he used to stay inside his factory with his coworkers at Omdurman, around 18 km from Khartoum, the epicentre of the strife, and rarely went out since missiles dropping in neighbouring areas had become a common occurrence. “I had no contact with my family — in UP’s Ballia — and they were very worried. All I want now is to quickly catch a train to Ballia,” Yadav said.

Reena Gandhi, from Ahmedabad, who was based in Omdurman for 18 years with her husband, a doctor, said: “We brought only three to four pair of clothes with us. We were waiting with baited breath for our country to rescue us…we knew that Sudan was undergoing a turmoil but did not expect things to come to such a pass.”

Her husband, Rupesh Gandhi, said: “A day after we left our home in Omdurman, our neighbour’s house was destroyed…there are still several Indian citizens stuck in strife-torn areas and are yet to be rescued.”

Satish Pal Maan, a worker at a tiles company, said he came on the rescue flight with his co-worker, Vijay Kumar, both of whom were rescued from Khartoum on April 24. “There is a lack of diesel and supplies have been cut off. Several buses have not been able to rescue people due to this reason…thousands of people like me are left with nothing but a few pair of clothes, as most of us fled with whatever we had,” he said.

Pramod Mishra, who worked at a steel factory in Khartoum, said, “I only came with a pair of jeans and some basic necessities…along with a few other Indians I was camping at a school for eight days…”