Tapas Meher, fifth-year MBBS pupil remembers Ukraine horror reaching house in Odisha 

Express News Service

NUAPADA:  For Tapas Meher, the journey from the war-ravaged Ukraine to his house in Nuapada was a minimum of a nightmare. The chilling scenes of bomb explosions, terrifying sound of emergency sirens and the struggling in sub-zero temperatures seem to be a foul dream to 26-year-old lad, a fifth-year MBBS pupil of Ivano-Frankivsk National Medical University.

Tapas reached his house at Duajhar village in Khariar block right here on Thursday. Recounting his harrowing expertise, he mentioned, “Though our university was outside the conflict zone, we were terrified to witness bombing at a distance of just two km from the campus on the day military operation was launched by Russia.”

On contacting the Indian Embassy, Tapas and his associates have been requested to achieve the border. “We decided to go through Romania and the authorities asked us to put up Indian flag on our vehicle for smooth passage. However, we were gripped with panic.”

Tapas was in a gaggle of 80 college students and discovering automobiles at such a disaster was a mammoth process because the transport system was disrupted as a consequence of incessant shelling and assaults. The personal transporters weren’t able to take the scholars. 

“We somehow managed to get two buses and reach Romania. However, many of our friends were stuck at the border as thousands of people reached there at the same time. The temperature fell below -10 degrees Celsius and many students suffered from hypothermia. It was disturbing to know about these incidents. Our evacuation was smooth after we reached Romania,” he knowledgeable.

Tapas alongside together with his associates got lodging in Romania for a day. They have been then despatched to New Delhi. Subsequently, he boarded a flight to Raipur from the place he reached Nuapada by street. The traumatic journey lasted for 4 days. While 5 college students together with Tapas have returned to Nuapada, a minimum of 12 others from the district are nonetheless stranded in elements of Ukraine.