New Delhi, Apr 16 (PTI) A field hospital deployed by India in Mandalay returned home on Wednesday after rendering medical service and providing much-needed relief for over two weeks to a large number of people injured in the wake of a devastating earthquake in Myanmar, officials said.

The hospital unit, comprising 118 personnel, was deployed in the neighbouring country using two C-17 heavy-lift aircraft of the Indian Air Force which had taken off from Agra on March 29.

The field hospital team returned to India on Wednesday as the aircraft landed at the Hindan Airforce Base, Ghaziabad, near Delhi, they said.

The 7.7-magnitude earthquake jolted Myanmar in March, with the toll rising to over 3,000 people even as rescuers have continued to search through the rubble for signs of life.

India mounted its relief mission ‘Operation Brahma’ as a swift response to the devastation caused by the earthquake that hit Myanmar as well as Thailand on March 28.

“When we went there the scale of devastation was quite huge. We established a 200-bed hospital there and within 12 hours of reaching, we were starting to reach out to patients,” Brig Naveen Kumar, Commander, 50 Parachute Brigade, told PTI Videos on Wednesday after landing at the airbase.

In all, about 2,509 patients were treated which included about 65 major surgeries. This included the most vulnerable, that is young children, women and elderly. We were able to save a lot many lives in this mission. It is of great satisfaction that we were able to help people of Myanmar, he said.

Lt Col Jagneet Gill, Commanding Officer, 60 Para Field hospital, said, “I have mixed memories. I have good memories of people whom we could help and they could recover well. There are also feelings which make you sad because of the devastation seen, the number of people who have become homeless, who had difficulty in surviving, that is also disheartening.” The head of Myanmar’s military government, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, had visited the field hospital on April 6 where Indian Army doctors and personnel had render yeoman service to quake-affected people. PTI KND AS AS