E-Paper
Phone call from wife saved Dehradun man from Afghanistan crisis
Gurung, an ex-serviceman from Uttarakhand, was all set to leave for Kabul on July 15 from Delhi when he got a phone call from his wife.
Amid the efforts being put by the government to bring back over 300 of its residents from Afghanistan, 49-year-old Sanjay Gurung can’t thank God enough for “saving” him from going to the war-torn country.
Gurung, an ex-serviceman from Dehradun, Uttarakhand, was all set to leave for Kabul on July 15 from Delhi when he got a phone call from his wife pleading not to go while he was in a taxi heading to the airport. Insisted by his mother too, he cancelled his plan midway while letting his three other friends go.
“After what I am witnessing in Afghanistan at present, I just think it was God who saved me with that phone call from my wife at the last moment before entering the airport. I just can’t thank God enough,” said Gurung, who was going to join a private security agency in Kabul.
Gurung said after retiring from the Army, he worked in a private security agency in Iraq in 2012 before going to Afghanistan for the same work.
“The private security agencies in Afghanistan majorly recruit Gorkhas with an army background. I went there and worked for nine years before coming back in January this year as the agency reduced my salary. I then applied to another agency and got selected, for which I was supposed to leave on July 15.”
He said fourteen others from Dehradun were also selected along with him in the same company.
“Eleven of them got their visa first and left earlier. Four of us got it late and booked our tickets on Kam Air’s flight on July 15... my wife frantically called me pleading me to return citing the troublesome situation in Afghanistan. I was a little hesitant to stay back and tried to pacify her over a video call. Then, my mother also pleaded and I finally decided to return,” said Gurung.
“I returned Dehradun on the same day and after a couple of weeks, the crisis triggered in Afghanistan with its ultimate fall in the hands of the Taliban. Then a few days ago, I received a video on WhatsApp in which a group of men like me from Dehradun could be seen appealing to the government to evacuate them. Among them, two of my three friends were also there. Though I feel fortunate, I am worried for their safety as well,” said Gurung, adding that while watching the news about Afghanistan, all the cities like Herat, Kandhar and Kabul where he worked, floated before his eyes.
Gurung is now putting efforts to help the other men from Dehradun stranded in Afghanistan.
“I am in touch with them while assuring them all possible help from my side for their evacuation. I am worried for their safety,” said Gurung.
Meanwhile, four residents of Dehradun who were stranded in Afghanistan returned on Thursday in the evacuation flights which are being operated from the Kabul international airport.
Chief minister Pushkar Singh Dhami said that the “Government is putting all efforts to evacuate the Uttarakhand residents stranded in Afghanistan.”
