Kashmiri students who were evacuated from Iran on Wednesday evening were locked in a faceoff with the Jammu and Kashmir government soon after they returned to Delhi as they were allegedly provided rundown buses for their journey back to the Valley, prompting chief minister Omar Abdullah to arrange for better transport.

A students’ association said another batch of around 600 Indian students, including 500 from Kashmir, had safely reached Mashhad from Qom in Iran. They had camped in Qom for three days after being transferred from Tehran and other locations.

“Their evacuation process is currently underway. Mashhad, a border city in Iran, is approximately 1,000km from Qom, a journey that takes around 15 hours by road. The students are from various institutions, including Islamic Azad University, Iran University of Medical Sciences, and Shahed Beheshti University. From Mashhad, they are expected to be taken to Turkmenistan, from where they will likely board flights to Delhi on Friday,” said the Jammu and Kashmir Students Association.

An external affairs ministry spokesperson said the government had launched Operation Sindhu to bring back Indians stranded in Iran.

“110 Indian students evacuated from Iran under #OperationSindhu have safely arrived in New Delhi on a special flight from Yerevan, Armenia. MoS @KVSinghMPGonda received them at the airport,” the spokesperson said.

“Government of India remains committed to the safety of Indian nationals abroad.”

Of the 110 students, more than 90 were from Jammu and Kashmir.

The students praised the Centre for their safe evacuation and provision of free boarding and transport facilities, but were angry to find the buses provided to them by the Jammu and Kashmir government for their onward journey to Srinagar in dilapidated condition.

“The condition of the buses was very bad. We were already exhausted after the four-day journey. Some of us booked air tickets early today to return home,” Saba Rasool, a fourth-year medical student in Iran, said in Srinagar.

The students uploaded videos which showed the buses were old and had tattered seats.

“After enduring a harrowing four-day journey from Iran via Armenia and Doha, Kashmiri students have finally reached Delhi, only to be dumped in SRTC (state road transport corporation) buses, unlike students from other states who were received with proper airport facilitation, care, and connecting flights home,” the students’ association said in a statement.

The criticism prompted Omar to intervene. The chief minister asked the resident commissioner in Delhi to coordinate with the Jammu and Kashmir Road Transport Corporation “to ensure proper deluxe buses are arranged”.

The students said they boarded the deluxe buses around Thursday noon after a 10-hour wait and were on their way to Kashmir.

A student said the situation in Iran was so bad that they had little expectations about their return.

Rasool, however, said some students wanted to stay in Iran out of solidarity, but were not allowed by the Indian embassy. “We knew the situation was bad (particularly) when they (Israel) said they wanted to assassinate the Rahbar (Ayatollah Ali Khamenei). We didn’t want to leave Iran, but the embassy did not allow us to stay on,” she said.