BENGALURU: It was a casual afternoon for 200-odd mothers of ‘Bangalore Humsafar’, a WhatsApp group of parents of children with Down’s Syndrome when a Facebook post popped up. It was by a techie returning home from work in a cab, who had found a 13-year-old boy with Down’s Syndrome, wearing a school uniform, standing on the main road of Kanakapura during the wee hours, over a week ago.
The post gripped the hearts of parents on the Humsafar group, drawing an almost immediate response. One parent rushed to Talaghattapura police station, where the boy was waiting for help. “One of the parents, who stay off Kanakapura Road, rushed to the station and saw the boy was muttering some words. The police thought he was from Kaggalipura and took him around to see if he lived there but till 4pm, they couldn’t trace his residence and brought him back to the station,” narrated Nayana Kiran, a dentist, and mother of 16-year-old Purab.
Being the mother of a child with Down’s Syndrome, she says she couldn’t rest with the boy sitting in the police station with no help. She and another parent reached the station again. “I couldn’t hold my tears when I saw how helplessly he was sitting there. In the police station, I could see everyone was busy and no one really had time to even check if this boy had to use the washroom or needed water. With no awareness on the disorder, they also seemed helpless. That’s the first time we as parents realised that police stations need awareness on it and how to handle such special children,” Nayana explained.
The two parents in the police station and other anxious parents in the group would not sleep without reuniting the boy with his parents. Special schools normally have uniforms with the name of the institution embroidered, or an ID card with a phone number, but this boy only had a diary which said ‘Aakash, AMC School’. Nayana then did a Google search for AMC School and reached out to a friend who runs a special school. After some tracking, they found that Aakash was missing for two days and his mother, Bharathi, was searching frantically for him.
Bharathi, a single parent and tea vendor at the Madiwala market area, was contacted and reunited with Aakash around 10 pm that night. Speaking to TNIE from Tirupathi, Bharathi said there were no words to express her feelings that night. “I had decided I would die by suicide if I didn’t find him. My husband left me because I delivered him. I work from 2 am to 8 pm to ensure I feed him and myself.
The techie who saved my son and these parents should be blessed with long life,” she wept. That agonising night, she had decided to take her son to Tirupathi if she found him alive and healthy. Parents on the Humsafar group say that schools should tutor such children on the parents’ mobile numbers, and areas where they live.
Parents further opined that schools, whether they teach academics or not, don't matter but they should teach such children a few emergency numbers, especially of parents, to name the area/locality where they live.
Mitesh Shetty, HOD and Consultant, Manipal Hospital says, "Even children with DS can lead a rather normal life with some extra care and support. There is not much awareness about this condition and hence the children are not able to receive the best possible care," A senior police official agreeing that there is a need for sensitisation and awareness amongst police about these conditions said, "we will try our best and the parents can definitely reach out to us. we will arrange for such camps," Meanwhile, the parents have decided to start creating awareness in their own localities and police stations near to their residences. They hope that the Home Minister of the state will take note of this and extend some help to them to reach out to police stations.