A total of 91 Indian nationals were recruited in the Russian Army of whom 14 have been discharged and eight died while 69 are awaiting release, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said in the Lok Sabha Friday.

He said there are reasons to suggest that the Indian nationals recruited in the Russian Army on false promises were misled, adding that the issue is taken by the government very seriously.

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“To Russia, we have, in total 91 cases so far of Indian nationals who were recruited into the Russian Army, eight of them, unfortunately, have passed away, 14 of them have been discharged, or in some manner have come back with our assistance and there are 69 Indian citizens who are awaiting release from Russian Army,” he told the House.

“I think in many cases there are reasons to indicate that our nationals were misled — that they were being told that they were going for some other job, and then they were then deployed to the Russian Army,” he said.

Mr Jaishankar said both Prime Minister Narendra Modi and he had personally raised these issues with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov during their visits to Moscow last month.

“I have myself raised it numerous times with Russian FM and when Prime Minister Narendra Modi was in Moscow last month, he raised it personally with President Putin and he got President Putin’s assurance that any Indian national who is in the service of the Russian Army will be discharged and released,” her stated.

“The problem is that the Russian authorities maintain that these Indian nationals entered into contracts for service with the Russian Army, we are not necessarily subscribing to that,” he said.

Asked about the actions taken in the matter, the EAM said that a criminal case has been registered in this regard.

He said, “CBI has registered a criminal case against 19 individuals and entities. They have examined those 14 people who have returned from Russia. Sufficient evidence has surfaced against 10 human traffickers whose identities we know. During the investigation, two of the accused were arrested on April 24, and two more on May 7. All the four accused are presently in judicial custody.”