It can be the plot of a movie. A kind-hearted woman rescued an 11-year-old girl fleeing from her home in the Sri Lankan refugee camp near here and re-united her with her family with the help of police in Tiruchi on Thursday night.
But for her timely help, the girl might have been stranded somewhere, as she did not have money to buy tickets even to go to Tiruchi. She was on her way to Chennai to meet her mother.
The VI standard girl had boarded a bus to Mattuthavani at the integrated bus stand after coming out of the school. Later, she took a bus to Tiruchi at around 5 p.m.
Helpless
It was only after the bus reached somewhere near Kottamapatti, the conductor asked her buy a ticket. The girl said she did not have any money. When the conductor insisted that she buy a ticket, the girl looked helpless.
A woman seated next to her offered to pay for her the ticket, according to the girl’s father, a painter.
She came to know the girl was running away to meet her mother in Chennai, and sought police help, the father said.
He added that the girl’s mother had left them for another man in Chennai, and had married her paramour. The girl’s father also remarried.
“Only ten days back, the girl had met her mother in Chennai during the vacation. But, suddenly she wanted to meet her again and left for Chennai without our knowledge,” the painter said.
Even as all the efforts by five teams to trace the girl went futile, the father lodged a girl missing complaint with Othakadai police here.
Suddenly, his (second) wife got a call around 10.45 p.m. from the All Women Police Station in Tiruchi stating that the girl was safe with them. Only then the family members breathed a sigh of relief.
“We travelled to Tiruchi in the midnight and brought her back home,” he said.
Stating that he did not know the identity of the woman rescuer, the father profusely thanked her for the timely help.
