Ukraine crisis: IAF's 4 evacuation flights with 798 Indians land in Hindon airbase
New Delhi, Mar 3: The IAF's four evacuation flights with 798 Indians from the Romanian capital Bucharest, Hungary's Budapest and Polish city Rzeszow landed at the Hindon airbase here on Thursday morning, sources said.
The Indian Air Force's first flight carrying 200 people from Bucharest landed at 1.30 am and Union Minister of State for Defence Ajay Bhatt welcomed them at the airbase, they noted.
All four IAF flights were conducted using C-17 military transport aircraft, sources said.
India has been evacuating its citizens through special flights from Ukraine's western neighbours such as Romania, Hungary and Poland as the Ukrainian airspace has been shut since February 24 due to the Russian military offensive.
The second evacuation flight of the IAF with 210 Indians from Budapest landed at the Hindon airbase on Thursday morning, sources mentioned.
A little while after the second, the IAF's third evacuation flight arrived at the airbase from Rzeszow with 208 Indians, they said, adding the fourth flight brought 180 Indians from Bucharest.
Four Union ministers have gone to Ukraine's western neighbours to facilitate the evacuation of Indian nationals.
Hardeep Singh Puri is in Hungary, Jyotiraditya Scindia is in Romania, Kiren Rijiju is in Slovakia and V K Singh is in Poland.
As part of #OpGanga, the first #IAF C-17 returned to Hindan airbase near Delhi, from Bucharest on 03 March at 1:00 AM carrying 200 passengers, mostly students.#HarKaamDeshKeNaam pic.twitter.com/GYTxqOxmCE
— Indian Air Force (@IAF_MCC) March 3, 2022
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Congress using hijab issue to pacify minority anger, alleges Karnataka LoP R Ashoka
Bengaluru: Leader of Opposition in the Assembly R. Ashoka has accused the Congress government of using the hijab issue to placate what he described as discontent among minority voters after the Davanagere by-election.
In a post on X on Wednesday, Ashoka alleged that the state government, instead of addressing issues such as price rise, corruption, farmers’ distress and law and order, was attempting to retain its minority vote base by reviving the hijab issue.
Referring to the 2022 dress code introduced by the BJP government, which prohibited hijab in schools and colleges, Ashoka said the Karnataka High Court had upheld the policy and emphasised the importance of discipline in educational institutions.
He questioned the Congress government’s move to revisit the issue and asked whether setting aside the court-backed policy to benefit one community could be described as secularism.
Ashoka further alleged that while the government was willing to permit hijab, it continued to prohibit saffron shawls.
He accused the government of dividing students on religious lines rather than treating schools and colleges as spaces of equality.
Drawing a comparison with Mamata Banerjee’s government in West Bengal, Ashoka claimed that excessive appeasement politics had harmed the state and warned that the Congress in Karnataka could face a similar political response.
He said voters in Karnataka would teach the Congress a lesson for what he termed “vote-bank politics” and for compromising constitutional and judicial principles.
