“My name is Usha Sree. I am currently in Chernivtsi, Ukraine. I came here to pursue my MBBS course. Right now, I am in 3rd year of my course study. I stay along with four of my friends here. Everything was normal until the war threat arose in Ukraine for the past few days. The area where I stay (Chernivtsi) is safe as of now from the war zone, but the situation here is totally unpredictable. We don’t know what would happen the next minute.

The circumstances here are critical and volatile. Everybody is stuck to their respective homes and you hardly see the people on the roads. The other day when my friends and I went out to get some food and groceries, I had witnessed a huge crowd buying groceries like it was at the time of lockdown. The banks and ATMs are shut down and there is not enough money to withdraw for the expenses. The native people here are also shaken and are vacating their places to the safer ones. This is extremely unfortunate and all of us are impacted because of this war. Leave alone the studies but people loosing their lives is extremely devastating, to say the least.

Some of my friends who used to reside at Kyiv, the capital city of Ukraine had to vacate to the safer places. The Russian forces invaded the outskirts of Kyiv. Many of my friends panicked and decided to go out of Ukraine and from there, return back to India.

At the moment, as the borders have been closed, the Government and embassies here are asking them to come back so they can make necessary arrangements and safely make them reach home. I am concerned for them and I only wish for their safe journey back to India. Last night, my friends and I couldn’t sleep. We have consulted the Indian Embassy, and they are helping us to get out from here. We want to request the embassy and the government to please fasten the process and make all the necessary arrangements so that we could come out of Ukraine as soon as possible and reach India safely to our families.”

Story of Usha Sree (centre)