MATHEWS, MAN WHO RESCUED INDIANS DURING GULF WAR, DIES
Indian businessman in Kuwait, Matthunny Mathews, who was instrumental in the safe evacuation of stranded Indians during the Iraqi invasion in 1990, passed away in Kuwait.
81-year-old Mathews, who hailed from Kumbanad in Pathnamthitta district, was ailing for some time and passed away on Saturday, media reports said.
Expressing his condolence, Kerala chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan said during the 1990 Gulf war Mathews had helped thousands of Indians flee the gulf nation and his services would always be remembered.
By not taking efforts to save his own life and property, Mathews had done yeoman service to bring his countrymen, who had lost everything in the war, safely back, Vijayan said. “He provided food and drinking water to the stranded Indians and we remember it with gratitude,” Vijayan said. The VP Singh government had in 1990 carried out the biggest evacuation during the gulf war when over 1.50 lakh standard Indians had been safely brought back by flight. At that time Mathews had functioned as the Central Government’s “unofficial representative” in Kuwait to coordinate the evacuation process, the chief minister said.
Popularly known as ‘Toyota Sunny’, Mathews was said to be the inspiration of Akshay Kumar’s character in Bollywood film ‘Airlift’. Mathews, left for Kuwait 1956 at the age of 20 in search of job.