Operation Sindhu: India’s Complex 2025 Evacuation Mission from Iran and Israel

India’s current ‘Operation Sindhu’ (2025) to evacuate its citizens from Iran and Israel is proving to be far more complex than the relatively smooth ‘Operation Ganga’ (2022) conducted during the Ukraine crisis.

While Operation Ganga benefited from open land borders and cooperative neighboring countries, enabling over 22,500 Indians to safely return home, Operation Sindhu faces:

• Geopolitical challenges, including hostile or logistically difficult neighbors (e.g., Pakistan’s closed airspace).
• Unreliable infrastructure within Iran.
• Widespread aerial attacks by Israel, complicating evacuation routes and demanding careful diplomatic navigation.

Despite the hurdles, India has successfully evacuated over 4,400 citizens:

• 3,597 from Iran
• 818 from Israel

Evacuees were moved via land routes to friendly countries like Armenia, Jordan, and Egypt, followed by special flights back to India. The process was significantly aided by Iran’s “special gesture” of temporarily opening its airspace for evacuation efforts.

Operation Sindhu underscores the complexities of crisis diplomacy and the evolving nature of evacuation missions in conflict zones.