As many as six youths from Odisha on Friday heaved a sigh of relief as they landed at the BijuPatnaik International Airport here from Delhi after being evacuated from conflict-torn Sudan under Operation Kaveri.

The returnees belong to Bhubaneswar, Baleswar, Bhadrak and Jagatsinghpur. They described the terrible ordeal they had to endure in Sudan before being rescued.

“I was staying in the strife-torn Khartoum region which has been severely ravaged by bullets and bombs. Somehow, we managed to reach Odisha with great difficulty. The attack began on April 15. We stayed there till April 24. Had we stayed there for one or two more days, we would have lost our lives. There were explosions all around in front of our company. We couldn’t sleep for nine days,” recalled Kedara Kumar Nayak, an electrical mechanic.

“I had been staying there since 2017. Earlier, there were also conflicts between the army and a paramilitary group. However, those were not as severe as the current one,” he added.

Another returnee, Santosh Swain said he and his company employees were looted at gunpoint. “We were held at gunpoint for around nine hours. All our valuables were looted. Somehow, we could save our lives and contact the Indian Embassy in Sudan. Thanks to the NarendraModi Government and Operation Kaveri, we could return to India,” Swain said.

Notably, over 600 Indians stranded in war-hit Sudan have been brought to India safely. The latest batch of 246 Indians evacuated from India landed safely in Mumbai on Thursday.