NEW DELHI, March 3: Hearing a petition seeking direction for evacuation of Indian students stranded in Ukraine, a Supreme Court bench headed by CJI N V Ramana on Thursday said, “We feel bad for the students, but can we direct Russia’s President Putin to stop war?”
The petitioner claimed that the Indian government is only focusing on evacuation from eastern Ukraine. “More students are stranded in other parts of Ukraine. They should also be evacuated and the government should be asked to take care of them,” the petitioner said. Responding to this, CJI Ramana asked the petitioner as to which government should be asked to take care of the students.
As per the petitioner, an observation from the top court “would help expedite the evacuation of all stranded students from Ukraine”.
SC asks Attorney General to help in evacuation
The Supreme Court, while noting that as per media reports, the Government of India appears to be doing its best to evacuate stranded Indian students from Ukraine, also asked Attorney General K K Venugopal to use his office in helping evacuate Indian students stranded in Ukraine near the Romania border.
The bench headed by CJI took note of the submissions of a lawyer that several students are stuck near the Romanian border in freezing cold and the government is not running flights from Romania.
“Flights are being operated from Poland and Hungary and not from Romania. The students, which also included many girls, are stuck without any facility,” the lawyer told the top court.
“We have all sympathies with them. But what can the court do,” the bench said.
It, however, asked the top law officer to consider extending help to the stranded students.
The AG, meanwhile, pointed out that a Union minister is in Romania to oversee expeditious evacuation of students crossing over from Ukraine. “It is strange that when Ukraine is allowing people to cross borders, students are complaining of being not allowed to cross,” he said. (AGENCIES)
Follow our WhatsApp channel
