Ronak Raval, 39, who works in a company in Denmark, had just come back from a vacation in Kenya when he read about Russia's invasion of Ukraine on the news and decided to make it his mission to help stranded pregnant women and children there.
This was his mission no 4.
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He had helped evacuate women from war-hit Syria and Crimea, when it was annexed by Russia in 2014. "My father had a helping nature. I just wanted to follow his path," Raval told BOOM, in Poland.
He first headed to the Poland-Ukraine border in Medyka, where he provided shelter to 47 pregnant women. "I took three houses on rent in Rzeszow, (a town near the border), where they were asking for three months' advance rent. I put up 47 women and kids there as they had nowhere to go," said Raval.
After that, he went to Budomierz border in Poland, where he assisted the Indian Embassy officials with translation and helped them interact with Polish officials and drivers.
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When the embassy officials asked him if he could help an eight-month pregnant Indian woman freezing in cold on Ukraine's side of the border waiting to cross, he got into someone's car and drove to the border. And then, he walked in the freezing cold to cross the border.
"When I met her, she was freezing," he recalled. The woman was with her husband, and Raval knew he couldn't take both of them across the border. So he quickly made a plan. Raval pretended to be the pregnant woman's partner in front of the Ukrainian officials and soldiers.
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"If I would have said the baby was Indian, it wouldn't have been possible to get them across," he told BOOM. "I told them she was pregnant with my child and that helped us get through. Ukraine is giving preference to Ukrainians, then Europeans and then anyone else," Raval explained.
Raval holds a Polish passport; he has lived in Poland for 14 years. He got the woman, 26-year-old Needhu Mohan, safely to Poland where she received medical help. Her husband crossed the border around eight hours later.
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Mohan, 26, had gone to Ukraine four months ago. She said two organisations and two people helped them to leave Ukraine safely. As the fighting broke out in Ukraine, she and her husband ran out of cash. It was the World Malayali Federation that booked them a cab from Lviv to Poland border.
She particularly remembers the cab driver who spoke to the soldiers at checkpoints. "The Ukrainian driver was godsent as he got us through many check posts and told cops I was unwell and needed to get to the border quickly. He dropped us a kilometre away from the border," she said.
"After waiting for hours at the border in a long queue, Ronak came and safely got me across the border. My health had deteriorated quite a bit by then. I got medical help and crossed the border in an ambulance."
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Soon after crossing over to Poland, she said she was assisted by the Kerala Association of Poland to get medical help. She is now awaiting her Visa extension as the doctors have advised her not to travel for now.
Mohan wasn't the only one helped by Raval. He crossed the border once more to help a two-month-old baby who had not eaten for 12 hours.
"A two-month-old baby was unwell, so I was asked to go help out. This time it took longer for me to cross the border back. While I was there, I saw another Indian woman who was freezing and she looked pale. I offered to help her too. This time, too, I claimed that the baby was mine as I knew that border staff changes everyday at 4pm. It took few hours, but I was eventually able to help the baby, his mother and another woman cross over to Poland," said Raval, who is now back in Denmark, trying to help people remotely.
The 39-year-old said he got a call from Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan as one of the women he rescued is from Kerala. "He called me to thank me for my effort," Raval said.
