GUWAHATI: Over 350 students from Assam , who were stranded in India’s coaching hub Kota , Rajasthan, owing to the nationwide lockdown, started their journey back home in 17 sleeper buses on Friday. They are expected to reach the Assam-West Bengal border by Sunday morning.State health minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said, “On their arrival, each of them will be sent to quarantine facilities. We will decide whether they will be quarantined at Srirampur (Assam’s entry point) or at the Sarusajai sports complex. Although they were quarantined in Kota, as they are travelling now and will be passing through several states, they might contract the infection. They will be tested after five days in quarantine centres here and will be released only after doctors say so.”Eight Assam police personnel, who were sent to Kota earlier, are escorting the 351 students who have arranged their over-1,900 kilometre homeward journey on their own.“Assam government was initially not willing to allow these students to come back to the state during the lockdown. However, after other states, like Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh, allowed students from their states to get back home, we, too, changed our minds,” Sarma said. He added that the state government has not arranged for the travel of these students who have been studying and preparing for NEET and JEE examinations.“We have only sent eight police personnel who are accompanying them. The students have paid for the trip on their own. Each student had to shell out Rs 7,000 as bus fare. Uttar Pradesh government is providing them a complimentary night halt and food at Kosi,” the health minister said. He added that he had held as many as four rounds of video conferences with these students and had advised them to not come back home until the lockdown ended. “But, they are all young students…teenagers,” Sarma said.After Uttar Pradesh sent special buses to bring back about 10,000 students from Kota last week, the other stranded students started a social media campaign #SendUsBackHome and sent out messages to their respective chief ministers demanding their evacuation. Even parents started using the hashtag to appeal for safe return of their children.