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The Kerala government has urged External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj to route the evacuation flights carrying Indians in Yemen through Kochi as the majority of evacuees are Keralites, mostly female nurses.
Of an estimated 3,000 Keralites working in the war-torn country, 823 have already been evacuated and of them, 247 had landed in Mumbai.
On Monday, Chief Minister Oommen Chandy held a meeting with senior ministers including the Minister in charge of the Norka (Non-Resident Keralites Affairs) Department KC Joseph, to take stock of the situation.
The meeting decided to get all the Keralites in Yemen back home in partnership with the Centre. The government has urged all of them to make use of the opportunity and leave the country where the continued stay would be risky.
Since Kerala nurses were a critical component of the medical care scene in Yemen, the hospitals were initially reluctant to let them go and in some cases were not handing their passports back. The Indian Embassy in Sanaa is now contacting these hospitals and other employers to press them to hand back the passports to the nurses. However, many hospitals are unwilling to oblige, it is learnt.
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