CHENNAI: A small boy, two-and-half-years old, was on Friday reunited with his mother, who had abandoned him on the streets of the city when she was in the depths of chronic depression. The family has to thank the Good Samaritans who saved them from different parts of the city and handed them over to NGOs, and a Tamil channel that aired a programme on the woman along with her family members.
Satyapriya, a 26-year-old woman from Bargur in Krishnangiri, came to the city in January with her young son in search of her husband. By then she had gone into depression after he abandoned her in May last. She was dressed in a red saree, had a lost look on her face, and remembered that she was from Bargur and the names of her siblings, but spoke nothing else.
Satyapriya had run away from home when she was only 16 to marry Anbu from Tirupattur in Vellore, said her mother Mangamma. “We were not able to find her. Then she came one day after about a year. She was pregnant,” Mangamma told Express.
According to her, it was only after six years that the family came to know that Anbu was already married twice and Satyapriya was his third wife. Anbu was working at Koyambedu. They had a child who is now nine. Things changed in 2013 when they began quarrelling over petty issues. Around that time, Satyapriya became pregnant again and delivered the second child, a son who is now two-and-half-years old. “Last May, she came home to us with both her children in tow and began staying with us. That is when we learnt that he deserted her,” Mangamma added.
Deeply shaken by this, she became depressed, began talking to herself and even breaking household items. “Worried about her, we consulted doctors who said she was depressed and assured that she will be fine,” Rajakumar said.
The family admitted the elder daughter in a hostel nearby as her mother underwent treatment. During Pongal last month, Rajkumar and Mangamma went to bring her home. “When we returned, Satya and her son were missing,” he added.
It was only when the crew members from a TV channel came to the village enquiring about Satyapriya that the family realised her wherabouts.
Meanwhile, on January 19, a street vendor at Marina beach spotted the young boy on the beach and handed him to the police, who, in turn, handed him over to the NGO, Don Bosco Anbu Illam. “As none came forward claiming the child till evening, we handed him over to the Child Welfare Committee,which sent the kid to Bala Mandir Trust the next day,” said Shalini, coordinator, Childline.
Meanwhile, the television crew also got in touch with CWC to trace the child. On Friday, after about a month, the mother was re-united with her son, and they, in turn, were back to the family.