Ukraine war-hit Indian students want government to save them

New Delhi: As the Russia-Ukraine conflict has entered its fourth month, the 18,000-odd Indian medical students who were studying in Ukraine are uncertain about their future. After being safely evacuated by the government of India through the “Operation Ganga” exercise, these students expect New Delhi to help them further. “The government helped us a lot. I was in a bunker, and was very worried for my life. We got in touch with the government representative through the college and they guided us to reach a safe place, afterwards we reached Romania and then came to India. But, now students like me want further cooperation from the government; the government should talk with the neighbouring countries of Ukraine, whose medical schools are also good to absorb us in them. If the government issues some guidelines and even nominates medical consultancies through the high commissions, it would be enough,” said Nishant Shandilya, who is a third year student at Dnipro State Medical University.
After the evacuation exercise, parents of students who were studying in Ukraine, met the public representatives and officials of their respective states to press the government to design a guideline for continuation of medical studies for these students. Afterwards, state governments had written to the government of India and the newly formed National Medical Commission (NMC) requesting to issue directives in the favour of students, so that their career would not be harmed in any way. Hence, the National Medical Commission (NMC) allowed the graduating students to complete their internship in Indian medical colleges.
“In the last five years, we helped more than 100 students to get admissions in Ukrainian medical colleges. In the last one month, after it got clear that it will not be possible for students to go again to Ukraine, we got in touch directly with many medical schools in Poland and Hungary. They are ready to take the students from the medical colleges of Ukraine. In all, 30 students through our consultancy applied for admission in the medical schools of Poland and Hungary,” said Vaibhav Mishra, who is associated with a medical consultancy. The Sunday Guardian also reached out to the NMC, the regulatory body of medical education in India, for a reply, but no reply was received till the time of going to press.
Another expert on medical education and admission, Priyaranjan Patel, who runs a consultancy in Dwarka, said, “Many parents are demanding from the government to accommodate students in the private and government medical colleges, it is not feasible. It will impact the standard quality of government colleges as these students were not able to crack the NEET examination.”