Kerala medical student Arya Aldrin said she has some relatives in Munnar, where she will stay with her pet dog for a few days to acclimatise the pet with the change in weather.
Kerala medical student Arya Aldrin (20), who earned praise for her struggle to get her pet dog back from war-torn Ukraine, arrived at the Delhi airport on Thursday. Though she got an opportunity to leave the war-ravaged country earlier she refused to go without her pet dog, a Siberian Husky.
“I was firm that if I go back to my country Zaira will accompany me. I really worked hard and was forced to undergo questioning at several points. Some people laughed at me. At one stretch, I had to walk 20 km so I was forced to dump my cloth bags to carry Zaira. I am relieved Zaira is with me,” the second year MBBS student from Idukki said. She will be taking a connecting flight to Kochi later in the evening. She said she had to work for two days to prepare the documents for her pet.
A picture of Arya travelling with her pet in an evacuation bus has gone viral on social media. She boarded a flight from Bucharest in Romania on Wednesday night. “Six months-old, the pet dog is not used to long walks. She cooperated with me fully. At one point she was tired as blisters appeared on her pugs so I dumped my bags to carry her,” Arya said in Delhi. She said she has some relatives in Munnar, where she will stay with Zaira for a few days to acclimatise the pet with the change in weather.
Many people took to social media to laud the young girl and her commitment towards her pet. Kerala Education Minister V Sivankutty was among those who praised her. “It is born out of love and I am sure the world will benefit from such love,” the minister wrote praising her in his Facebook post.
Once she reached India, Arya thought that her week-long troubles were over but she got a rude shock after two private airlines refused her a ticket saying they did not have facilities to carry pets in their aircraft.
Later, the Kerala House in Delhi also told her that she needed to arrange a ticket for her pet dog as it will create “unnecessary precedent and facilitate other students also to bring their pets”. But later the Kerala government intervened and both the girl and her pet will now be travelling to Kochi on Friday on an Air India flight. The government has also arranged accomodation for both in Kerala House, a spokesperosn of the state government said.
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