He was welcomed at the Chennai airport by Union Minister Piyush Goyal and TN BJP President Nainar Nagenthran. Photo by R Ramesh Shankar

Chennai: A total of 348 Indian citizens from different parts Tamil Nadu Those stranded in Iran and its neighboring state for over a month after the war broke out in West Asia, landed in Chennai on a special flight organized by Indian Embassy officials from Armenia.Of the 348 passengers, 327 were Tamils, five were from Puducherry, while 10 were from Kerala. Most of the Tamils ​​were natives of Tirunelveli, Kanyakumari and Nagapattinam districts and were working as fishermen in Iran. Union Minister Piyush Goyal and TN BJP President Nainar Nagenthran welcomed them and sent them to their respective cities in special buses.The returnees said they were unsure of their fate until they reached Tamil Nadu.Peter Blasian, 46, from Kanyakumari, said he had barely slept every day for the past month due to frequent explosions nearby. “It’s very difficult to explain how we felt. We had very little hope,” he said. Peter Blasian, along with 22 other people as a team, staffed Kish Island in Bandar Abbas and their primary job was to go out to sea for fishing.Although employers supported them with food after the war-like situation began in Iran, they had to pay from their own pockets to leave their workplace and undertake a dangerous 18-hour journey by bus to the city of Qom, where Indian Embassy officials welcomed them.“From there, the embassy took good care of us with proper food and accommodation and onward travel to Armenia via Julfaar,” he said. Another native of Kanyakumari, Anish Raja, 34, said he had gone to Iran just three months ago and never thought he would have to return home in such a crisis. “We went to Iran to work as fishermen for better income, but now the future looks bleak,” he said.