External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Friday said the government is awaiting the release of 69 Indians recruited into the Russian army and that in many cases there are indications that the Indian nationals were misled.

Speaking in the Lok Sabha, the minister also said the government has taken up seriously the issues of recruitment of Indian nationals into the Russian army and cyber crime trafficking of nationals to South East Asian countries.

There are a total of 91 cases so far of Indian nationals being recruited in the Russian army. Out of them, eight have passed away, 14 have been discharged or sent back, and the release of 69 nationals is awaited, Jaishankar said during the Question Hour.

"We take this issue very very seriously... I have myself raised it many times with the Russian foreign minister," he said and added that Prime Minister Narendra Modi also took up the issue during his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin last month.

The minister said the problem is that the Russian authorities maintain that these Indian nationals entered into contracts for services with the Russian army.

"We are not necessarily subscribing to that... I think in many cases there are reasons to indicate that our nationals were misled, that they were told that they were going for some other job and then they were deployed with the Russian army," he said.

Jaishankar said the prime minister got Putin's assurance that any Indian national, who is in the service of the Russian army, will be discharged and released.

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