After years of waiting to return home, Geeta, the deaf and mute girl in Pakistan, who is believed to have crossed the border by mistake after being separated from her family in 2003, is heading back to India.
Confirming the development,the Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson said: “Geeta is a daughter of India,” adding that “Geeta’s citizenship has been verified and we will soon be bringing her back to India.”
The spokesperson also disclosed that Geeta had identified the family in one of the three photos of different families sent by the Indian High Commission.
However, officials say that while Geeta could return by a direct flight from Karachi to Delhi as soon as October 26 or November 3, she will probably go first to a special rehabilitation centre and not to her family. This is because the government wants to verify a DNA match before handing her over to her family.
“We have identified two institutions in Delhi and Indore, which can deal with her disability until she is ready to go home,” spokesperson Vikas Swarup told reporters in Delhi.
The case of Geeta has been a rare heart-warming story in otherwise strained relations between India and Pakistan, as both governments have moved to expedite her case.
“ We have located her family. She will be handed over to them only after the DNA test. ”
- —Sushma Swaraj
While Indian High Commission officials have regularly visited her over the years, her case only caught the public eye this year, when the Salman Khan-starrer Bajrangi Bhaijaan portrayed a story similar to her in reverse.
As Edhi foundation officials spoke to the media about how desperately Geeta had been signalling her desire to return to India, which she wrote about in her diary in Devnagari script, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj took a personal interest in resolving the issue. She directed Indian High Commissioner TCA Raghavan to travel to Karachi to meet Geeta, and he subsequently confirmed her Indian citizenship.
“It is very rare for a High Commissioner to personally write the report on citizenship confirmation, but it was clear that this is no ordinary case,” an official told The Hindu. The official also confirmed that Pakistan’s government has moved swiftly to clear Geeta’s return. “All clearances have now been received, and the High Commission is preparing to send Geeta back to India,” the official added.
Eventually, it was Ms. Swaraj who broke the news herself, tweeting on Thursday morning: “Geeta will be back in India soon. We have located her family. She will be handed over to them only after the DNA test.”
The only hurdle that seems to remain now is to ensure that Geeta is reunited with her real family, given that there are several claimants, each of whom has lost a child around the time Geeta was found. It is believed that Geeta has identified the Mahto family from Bihar as her parents, and that their lost daughter’s name was Heera, but another family from Pratapgarh district of Uttar Pradesh is equally convinced that Geeta is their daughter Savita, who was lost in 2003 during a pilgrimage.
According to reports, the Mahto family has been brought to Delhi to prepare for Geeta’s return, even as the woman from Uttar Pradesh claiming to be her mother, Anara Devi, says she will also send her DNA samples to the government.
“I will do everything possible to get my daughter back. Whatever the officials ask me to,” Anara Devi told The Hindu on the phone.
Not perturbed by the fact that there are several families who claimed Geeta as their daughter and that Geeta hadn’t recognised her, she said she even has a photograph that will match the photograph of Geeta when she was found in Pakistan.
Meanwhile, whether she is in fact Heera or Savita, Geeta, who has won the hearts of many with her determination to return to India, is coming to terms with the fact that her wish will be fulfilled soon. Asked what has kept her resolve strong all these years, the Edhi family said it was “Geeta’s faith.” Apart from her diary that recorded her determination to return to India, Geeta prayed to Hindu idols, and the Edhis often took her to local temples. Speaking to reporters in Karachi, an Edhi foundation spokesperson said she might be accompanied on the journey home by the person who has taken care of Geeta all these years, Mrs. Bilquis Edhi, and she would be taking the small temple in her room in Karachi back to India with her.
