By Mubasshir Mushtaq
MUMBAI, India
India on Saturday and early Sunday morning evacuated over three hundred Indians stranded in Nepal after the powerful earthquake killed over 1400 people.
“First God saved us. Now the Indian government has saved us,” M.J. Akbar, spokesperson of ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, who was among the first batch of 55 Indians evacuated from Nepal, told AA on phone early on Sunday.
“India was really quick in sending help,” Akbar said adding that it was a chaotic scence in Nepal’s capital as many residents and tourists were out on the road as the city recorded aftershocks late on Saturday night.
Akbar, a former journalist and well-known author, was in Kathmandu when the deadly quake hit Nepal and much of north India and Bangladesh.
India evacuated 312 Indians from quake-hit Nepal in three aircrafts.
“First aircraft with 55 landed at Delhi at 2220 hrs. Second with 100 and third with 160 have also left Kathmandu,” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup announced on Twitter.
“A fourth aircraft with 160 is expected to leave Kathmandu by about 1 am tonight. More flights planned for tomorrow,” Swarup wrote early on Sunday.
India is set to send 10 aircrafts on Sunday to evacuate quake-affected people from Nepal, reported Times of India daily on Sunday.
India was the first neigbouring country to send aircrafts, relief and rescue teams and medical aid.
285 teams belonging to National Disaster Response Force were flown to Nepal in three Indian Air Force aircrafts to assist Nepal Army in rescue operations.
Indian embassy in Kathmandu was partially damaged in the earthquake killing daughter of one Indian official.
“A house in our embassy complex collapsed. Unfortunately, the daughter of our employee Madan has died. His wife’s condition is serious,” India’s Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj wrote on Twitter on Saturday.
Meanwhile, donations poured in from India as Prime Minister Narendra Modi spoke to his Nepali counterpart Sushil Koirala assuring all the help.
“Received a call from Pujya Morari Bapu. He has donated Rs. 51 lakh [$80,000] for relief work in Nepal. My deepest gratitude to him,” Modi announed on Twitter.
Indian yogi mystic Jaggi Vasudev, popularly known as Sadhguru, said that places of tremendous historicity damaged in the Nepal earthquake.
“Hope lives lost are minimal. Hope the world responds to the needs of people of #Nepal and help to restore their heritage,” Vasudev wrote on his official Facebook page.
