Eid Mubarak: Amazing! A viral video helps missing mentally deficient youth reunite with family for EID

This Ramadan Eid turned to be the most happening one for a family after their 25-year-old mentally deficient son came back home with the help of viral video and a social worker's efforts, making it a doubly joyous occasion for his worried kin. The youth had gone missing two months ago in the month of April and was spotted by Pune's Pimpri-Chinchwad resident Yogesh Malkhare two weeks ago, walking on the side of a road in Aurangabad.

The Smile Plus foundation founder felt something is not good with the youth and followed him for few kilometres, and then he approached him. He made a video of his encounter with the youth, which he put online and surprisingly, it was not just shared some 46,000 times, but also helped track the individual’s family down to Buldhana district.

Malkhare had met the youth on June 3 in Aurangabad, where he had gone for some work. “When I asked him some simple questions about himself, he remembered only his name,” Malkhare was quoted saying to Pune Mirror. The next day, Malkhare got a court order and the mentally deficient youth was admitted to the mental institution in Yerwada. And a day after he was admitted, someone called him from the neighbouring village who recognised the youth.

Finally, on June 14, the youth’s labourer father came down to take him home for Eid. “I would work for four days and spend all that money looking for my son for the next three days. The fact that he has come home for Eid is a blessing to us for never giving up,” said his father. “It was stressful and eventually got impossible to get our son admitted, as no authority was willing to cooperate. Now that it is done, we could not be more grateful. We know this will only benefit our son and the whole family, who never liked to see him struggle this way,” the father added.

We salute Malkhare and his effort to reunite the youth with his family!

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