Air India special flight with 183 Indians, including 46 nurses set free from Iraq, arrives in Kochi at 11.57 AM, says airport official. (Source: PTI) Air India special flight with 183 Indians, including 46 nurses set free from Iraq, arrives in Kochi at 11.57 AM, says airport official. (Source: PTI)

The 46 Indian nurses, who were kidnapped by Sunni militants in Iraq, were released in a “dramatic development” on Friday. The Special Air India flight carrying 46 Indian nurses have reached Kochi where Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy with nurses’ family members have reached to welcome them.

Here are the highlights:

# Medical ambulances on standby to administer any medical help to the nurses if required

# Ecstatic frenzy in Kochi as freed Indian nurses walk out of airport.

# Air India plane carrying 46 Indian nurses lands in Kochi, Kerala CM Ommen Chandy along with family members welcome freed nurses and others.

# Family members and relatives have been given special passes to receive the nurses.

# Special Air India flight carrying 46 Indian nurses and 137 others takes off from Mumabi for Kochi.

# The nurses would be received by Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy, Opposition leader V S Achuthanandan, apart from their family members.

# The airport authorities in Kochi have made special immigration counters for the nurses, who were rescued from the custody of ISIS, and now are on their way to the city.

# The flight has made a ‘technical halt’ in Mumbai for refuelling and catering supplies, and will leave for Kochi at 9:55 am where it will reach at around 11:55 am. The flight would then leave for Hyderabad at 12:55 pm and arrive in the city at 1425 hours. The flight’s last destination would be Delhi where it would arrive at 1740 hours.

# Nurses kept me updated even when they were held captive in Iraq: Oommen Chandy.

# Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy says he met External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj four times just in 20 hours.

# Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy is expected to welcome the nurses at Kochi airport.

# Parents and relatives of 46 nurses anxiously wait for their return at Kochi international airport.

What happened in Iraq

3. The 39 Indians construction workers, who have been held hostage in Iraq are still in captivity.

2. India sent Boeing 777 aircraft with a seating capacity for about 300 to bring back 46 nurses and other Indians stranded in strife-torn Iraq on Friday.

1. The nurses were taken by ISIS Sunni militants on Thursday from a hospital basement in Tikrit to an undisclosed location strife torn city of Mosul, 250 km from Tikrit.

# Special Air India flight carrying 46 Indian nurses and 137 others from strife-torn Iraq lands in Mumbai at 8:43 AM, says Airport official.

# The special Air India flight carrying 46 Indian nurses set free by Sunni militants ISIS in strife-torn Iraq and 137 others is expected to first land in Mumbai and reach Kochi around noon.

# In what the Ministry of External Affairs described as “dramatic developments”, Sunni militants on Friday released the 46 nurses they had taken from Tikrit to Mosul a day earlier, and had them escorted to the Kurdish border where they were met by Indian officials. The nurses were taken to the airport at Erbil, the capital of the autonomous Kurdistan region in Iraq’s north, from where a special Air India aircraft sent by New Delhi was to fly them back.

📣 The Indian Express is now on Telegram. Click here to join our channel (@indianexpress) and stay updated with the latest headlines

For all the latest India News, download Indian Express App.