Thread by @samjawed65

A narrative is being built that there were multiple advisories but the students did not leave Ukraine. Here is the timeline of what happened. Thread 👇1/n

The first advisory issued on Feb 15 asked Indian nationals whose stay is ‘non-essential’ to ‘consider’ leaving Ukraine. 2/n

https://twitter.com/indiainukraine/status/1493578367714607112

Students in the middle of an academic term, whose universities did not move to online classes may have different perceptions of ‘non-essential’. Contrast this to the unambiguous 2015 Yemen advisory asking ALL Indian nationals to LEAVE, essential or non essential. 3/n

Next day the embassy issued FAQs for students. The very first point was about flights being fully booked. It said MEA was in discussion with min of civil aviation for expanding flights 4/n

Note other than connecting options, there was only one direct flight (Ukraine Airlines) to India which did not operate daily. Finally On Feb 18th, three special Air India flights were announced for Feb 22, 24 and 26. 5/n

https://twitter.com/airindiain/status/1494637431471022080

The flights were sold out as soon as they were announced and there were multiple tweets from students requesting for more flights 6/n

Others tweeted about their inability to afford the high ticket prices 7/n

On Feb 20th, the Embassy issued a second advisory asking all nationals whose stay is not essential and ‘all’ Indian students to leave Ukraine by available commercial or charter flights. Note the difference from the first advisory that now all students were asked to leave 8/n

Next day, on Feb 21st, three more AI flights were announced for Feb 25th & 27th. 9/n

Then came the Feb 22nd advisory addressed to students: Leave rather than wait for official confirmation from Universities. Clearly the situation was escalating. 10/n

On the same day, the first AI flight scheduled brought brought back 242 Indian nationals. There were 5 more previously announced AI flights to go. And a promise that more will soon be announced. 11/n

On Feb 24th, the second AI flight had to turn back because by then Ukraine had closed it’s airspace. None of the other pre announced AI flights from Ukraine to India materialized. It was too late. 12/n

Judge for yourself whether it is fair to blame the students and their parents like @aajtak correspondent did and many others continue to do. 13/13