22 yrs on, 68-yr-old woman presumed dead reunited with family in hospital

Lost at 12 when she became a child bride forced into a life she could comprehend. Lost again at 46 when the strain of premature motherhood & mental illness drove her away from home. Lost for 22 years to a family that had given her up for dead after failing to trace her. But life often finds a way to lead people back to where they belong.

The usually quiet surroundings of Nagpur's Regional Mental Hospital witnessed an extraordinary reunion Monday - a speechless son, now 30, falling at his 68-year-old mother's feet; a husband's eyes welling up as his wife recognised him with a shy smile; and relatives waiting for their turn to embrace her.

Her story began in 2011, when police found a disoriented woman wandering the streets and took her to the hospital. She spoke Hindi with a Bengali accent and remembered almost nothing. For years, no one knew who she was or where she came from.

The breakthrough came after 13 months of counselling by social service superintendent Kunda Katekhaye-Bidkar, in coordination with medical superintendent Dr Satish Humne and psychiatrist Dr Pankaj Bagde. Gradually, the woman mentioned a place called "Bandri," her husband and sons' names, and a relative's description. These fragments led the team to Bandri in MP's Sagar district.

Acting on the hospital's request, SHO's team traced her family after weeks of checking records. "The details about her husband and sons matched," said Katekhaye-Bidkar. "This isn't a reunion," Dr Humne said. "It's proof that when empathy and effort meet, miracles do happen."

Select The Times of India as your preferred source on Google Search