'Felt close to death': Indian seafarers detained in Iran return home
Mohammad Sartaj Alam/BBCEight Indian seafarers who were detained in Iran in December have returned home after weeks of delay caused by the war in the Middle East.
The men were part of an 18-member crew - 16 Indians and one each from Sri Lanka and Bangladesh - on a ship seized by Iranian authorities who alleged they were smuggling fuel. The company operating the ship denied this.
Eight crew members returned to India on 10 February. The remaining eight Indians reached home on Sunday after an arduous journey that involved travelling via land to Armenia and then taking a flight via Dubai.
The crew members from Sri Lanka and Bangladesh also flew back to their countries from Armenia.
The ship, MT Valiant Roar, operated by Dubai-based Prime Tankers LLC, was seized on 8 December while it was in international waters.
Some of the crew members were taken to a jail in Iran's Bandar Abbas port city, while the others were detained on the vessel.
In January, their families approached a court in India, seeking government intervention, following which India's foreign ministry said it had secured consular access to them.
Eight men returned to India on 10 February, but the others, including five Indians in jail, received their release order only on 27 February.
A day later, the US and Israel began military strikes on Iran, prompting it to retaliate. Flights and border crossings across the region were disrupted.
"The joy of the release order did not last even a few hours," Vijay Kumar, the ship's captain, said as he recalled the ordeal.
Though Iranian authorities returned their passports, the security situation forced the sailors to stay put on the ship in Bandar Abbas.
Kumar said the ship was docked close to an Iranian naval facility, placing them uncomfortably close to potential targets.
"We could only watch helplessly as missiles fell around us through the night," he said.
He added that Iranian authorities had removed key navigation and safety equipment from the ship when they seized it, making it impossible to move to a safer location. BBC News Hindi has contacted Iran's embassy in Delhi for a comment.
On 3 March, the Indian embassy in Tehran evacuated the crew - Kumar said this included the Sri Lankan and Bangladeshi men - from the ship and arranged rooms for them in a hotel in the city.
The BBC has contacted the high commissions of Sri Lanka and Bangladesh in Delhi for comment.
Mohammad Sartaj Alam/BBCIn Tehran, the situation remained tense.
Ketan Mehta, one of the engineers on the ship, said the threat of missile strikes meant the crew could not sleep in the day or night.
"Every moment felt close to death," said Anil Kumar Singh, the ship's chief engineer.
Crew members said explosions nearby caused the walls of their hotel to shake through the night.
The men said they stayed in the Tehran hotel until the land route out of Iran became accessible. On 15 March, they began travelling towards Iran's border with Armenia, sometimes passing through areas which were being bombed.
They took shelter in Jolfa - an Iranian city located about 60 km (37 miles) from the Armenian border - where they waited for three days before receiving visas.
They crossed into Armenia on 27 March and travelled to the capital, Yerevan, where they spent a night at a hotel. From there, the Indians flew to Dubai and then on to Mumbai city, arriving in the early hours of 29 March.
Masood Alam, one of the crew members, said he was still shaken by the experience.
Alam was due to get married after Eid, which was last week. But the ceremony had to be postponed. His family has now resumed preparations for the wedding and a new date will be fixed soon.
Some crew members alleged they had not been paid for several months and were unsure whether they would return to work with Prime Tankers.
The company's owner Jugwinder Brar did not respond to calls and messages.
