: A missed call from an unknown number reunited a family with its 14-year-old son who had gone missing from outside his Delhi home around a year ago.
The boy, who had fled home because of his alleged lack of interest in studies, was recovered by the Delhi Police from Jammu last week.
Ravindra Yadav, Joint CP (Crime), said the boy had left for Vaishno Devi in a bus in August last year. He was scared to return home to his parents as he had left without informing them, the officer said.
For the first few months, he loitered around the Vaishno Devi shrine and Katra areas and survived on meals provided at langars. A local resident, Kailash, who has a business of providing mules and horses to devotees headed to Vaishno Devi, spotted him one day and inquired about his whereabouts. A father of seven daughters, Kailash decided to take care of the boy. “The man (Kailash) found the boy roaming around his workplace. He spoke to him and learnt that he had left home without informing his parents and was in need of care. He took the boy to his home and began taking care of him,” said the officer, clarifying that the boy was not ill-treated in any way.
Matter reported
The boy’s parents, meanwhile, lodged a missing complaint at Outer Delhi’s Shahbad Dairy police station. The local police probed the case, but without any success. Last month, his parents suddenly received a missed call from the boy from an unknown number. The boy, who had been missing his family ever since he left home, decided to ring up his parents but disconnected the call before someone could answer it. On checking the location of the phone number, his parents learnt that the call was made from Jammu. Never having lost hope of their son’s return, the parents immediately suspected the caller to be their boy. “The family did not have any relatives in Jammu and did not know anyone there, so they saw no reason why someone from the State would call them,” said an investigator.
Meanwhile, the Delhi Police’s crime branch, which had been handed over the case just a few days before the missed call, took the call seriously and began probing the details of the caller.
The probe revealed that the boy was last spotted in Kajhali village of Jammu district. A team was dispatched there and the boy recovered last Thursday.
“The child’s statement has been recorded before a magistrate and he has been handed over to his parents,” said the police on Tuesday.
