CHENNAI: If not for the Chennai police, the NRI son of an elderly couple living here wouldn’t have heaved a sigh of relief - he could not contact them for days ever since the rains wreaked havoc on the city.
Soon after the SoS call landed on the network of the city police, the message was relayed to the local teams, who reached the address provided by the NRI and found the couple Selvaraj (72) and Devi (65), safe and sound at Jain Apartments, Vembuliamman Koil Street in Valasaravakkam. Their son could not reach them since their mobile phone networks were down, not to mention the enforced power outage to prevent electrocution casualties.
The police provided them essentials including milk, water, bread and other items. They took a picture with the couple, which was sent by WhatsApp to their son in California, whose joy knew no bounds upon seeing it. This is not just one incident where the City Police had stepped in to get families connected with those stranded in the city.
The kin of Anish-ur-Rahman (60), a Bangladeshi national, who was admitted to MIOT for a knee-surgery, who were in panic after the reports of 18 deaths at MIOT due to power failure, sought the help of the City Police, who in turn, traced the patient to the same hospital and Whatsapped his image to the kin much to their relief. The Italian Embassy too sought the help of the City Police to know about two of their citizens who were visiting Babuji Ashram in Manappakkam. The duo was traced to a hotel near the airport and they left the city on Saturday.
Similarly, Nachiar aka Anandha Bhairavi, headmistress of a State-run higher secondary school in Kallanai, Tirunelveli, told ‘Express’ that she heaved a sigh of relief only after hearing from her brother Subash Kannan living in West Mambalam. “He told me that he had shifted to the Ist floor where his landlord lives, since the ground floor where he lived was inundated, on Wednesday. He could not be reached thereafter. I was worried. I sought the help of the Chennai City Police at around 6.30 pm, on Friday. Within 30 minutes, I got a call from an unknown number and was pleased to hear my brother’s wife,” she recounted as to what transpired on Friday.