Foreign minister S. Jaishankar told the Lok Sabha on Wednesday that New Delhi was in touch with countries neighbouring Ukraine to help Indian medical students evacuated from the war-torn country to pursue their studies in those nations.

“There was an offer from Hungary, and in addition to Hungary we have been in touch with Poland, Romania, the Czech Republic and Kazakhstan, because they all have similar models of education,” Jaishankar said, responding to questions from several MPs during discussions on the matter.

Participating in the discussion on Tuesday on the situation in Ukraine, several MPs had expressed concern over the disruption of the education of the evacuated students and urged the government to help them to pursue their studies in India.

Trinamul’s House leader Sudip Bandyopadhyay had said chief minister Mamata Banerjee had written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and also taken up the plight of 350 students from Bengal. Sudip said the chief minister wanted to absorb the students from Bengal in medical colleges in the state, to which Modi replied that they would be sent to Hungary.

Raising the issue after Jaishankar’s reply, Sudip wanted to specifically know the fate of the students from Bengal and sought a timeline from the minister.

The foreign minister did not give a clear reply, saying the education ministry and other organisations concerning medical education were seized of the matter and he was only informing the House about the initiatives being taken by his ministry.

Jaishankar said the Ukraine government had decided to extend relaxations to students to complete their studies and gave specific examples of students at different levels.

“For third-year students to go to fourth year, there is an exam called KROK 1. The Ukraine government has decided to postpone it to the next academic year and allow students to progress to the next academic year based on completion of their study requirements,” he told the Lok Sabha.

For sixth or final-year students, Jaishankar said, the Ukraine government has decided to award them degrees based on the results of their earlier academic assessments without taking the mandatory KROK 2 exam.

India is in talks with countries neighbouring Ukraine to help all other students to pursue further studies, he said.

On giving relief to students who have taken education loans, the minister said 1,319 students had outstanding loans. He said the finance minister had already informed the House that the government had asked an Indian bank association to assess the impact of the conflict and initiate discussions with regard to the loans.

Jaishankar hailed the government’s evacuation of students from Ukraine, terming it the largest such drive so far undertaken by India in the middle of a war.