The paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in Sudan’s Al Fashir have kidnapped a 36-year-old Indian national as the civil conflict continues to devastate the nation which has resulted in the greatest humanitarian crisis in history. The victim has been identified as Adarsh Behera from the Jagatsinghpur district in Odisha. He was abducted from Al Fashir (El Fasher) which is roughly 1,000 kilometres from Sudan’s capital Khartoum.
An Indian national, Adarsh Behera from Odisha was kidnapped by Rapid Support Forces militiamen.#sudan pic.twitter.com/9xRIW6VZVp
— World Monitor ? (@WorldMonitor247) November 3, 2025
According to NDTV report, in the video Adarsh was seen seated between two RSF soldiers when one of them inquired, “Do you know Shah Rukh Khan”. He was asked by another soldier behind him to declare, “Dagalo good.” Dagalo is the infamous RSF supremo Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo Musa, popularly known as “Hemeti.”
Adarsh has probably been transferred to Nyala which is around 1,200 km from Khartoum and the capital of South Darfur in southwest Sudan, a bastion of the RSF. He has been employed with Sukarati Plastic Factory in the North African country since 2022. According to his spouse, Susmita, the pair has two boys, ages three and eight. “There is no source of income. His abduction has left us helpless,” she voiced. Susmita is from Kotakona village which is within the jurisdiction of Tirtol police.
Ritanjali Mallika, the sarpanch of Tarajanga panchayat also shared his worry about the occurrence and pointed out that everyone in the hamlet was concerned about Adarsh’s safety. “His father, Khetramohan Behera and other members are living in fear as we are uncertain about his rescue,” he outlined.
“I am here in Al Fashir where the situation is very bad. I have been living here for two years with great difficulty. My family and children are very worried. I request the state (Odisha) government to help me,” Adarsh was seen requesting with folded hands as he sat on the floor, in a clip shared by his family.
Sudanese officials promise assistance
Khartoum served as the military’s final stronghold in Darfur and was recently taken by the RSF which surrounded it for 18 months and prevented thousands of residents from receiving food and other necessities. Mohammed Abdalla Ali Eltom, Sudan’s ambassador to India assured that his government is working to secure the Indian man’s release.
“As you can expect, there is a complete communication blackout in Al Fashir. No one can contact anyone in the city right now. And we, of course, hope that he is not to be harmed or hurt by any mistake. This is very unpredictable. We kind of know what we need to do. And we have seen what they are capable of doing. We hope that he will be treated well. And we hope that we can see him coming back safely soon,” he added.
Sudanese officials noted that they are coordinating with India’s Ministry of External Affairs for Adarsh’s release. Eltom mentioned that efforts to repatriate him were being handled jointly by both governments. “Even before that, during the siege of one of the Sudanese cities, the Indian ministry had reached out to us about another of its citizens there, who endured very difficult conditions during those 500 days,” he further expressed.
Bloodshed and voilence rocks Sudan
Violent clashes between the RSF and the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) have been occurring in Sudan since 2023. This horrific struggle which has forced almost 14 million people to abandon their homes has been centred in Khartoum. The RSF riding on camelback and Toyota technicals enetually overrun Al Fashir’s final government foothold.
A study conducted by Yale’s Humanitarian Research Lab (HRL) using remote sensing data and satellite pictures seemed to validate accounts of mass murders. Clusters of artefacts and discoloured ground were signs of human bodies and blood pools, according to the HRL. According to the United Nations, more than 26,000 people have left Al Fashir in just two days. The International Organisation for Migration estimated that there are nearly 177,000 civilians stranded in the city.
On 3rd November, the International Criminal Court issued a warning, citing reports of mass murders and rapes in the area, that their actions would qualify as war crimes.
Videos of civilians, mostly men and boys, being executed, beaten and ridiculed have been uploaded online by the RSF itself. Several human rights investigators have confirmed the visuals which has gone viral on social media. Al Fashir “appears to be undergoing a systematic and intentional process of ethnic cleansing of indigenous non-Arab communities through forced displacement and execution,” the Yale assessment highlighted.
Noatbly, the history of Sudan is entrenched in violence as the nation suffered through a series of violent clashes in its southern, western and eastern regions since obtaining independence in 1956, following about 60 years of Anglo Egyptian control. The South Sudanese civil war is projected by the UN to have killed about two million people, before the region’s succession in 2011. Similarly, the Darfur conflict in western Sudan claimed the lives of over 300,000 between 2003 and 2019.
