Pinki and Devashis appeal for help at Guwahati Press Club on Thursday. Picture by Eastern Projections

June 14: All Pinki remembers about her father is his name.

And that name, she hopes, will help her find him one day.

An inmate of Snehalaya — Pinki came to the city to work as a domestic help 12 years ago.

Now 18, Pinki fails to understand why she should live in an orphanage when both her parents are alive — she hopes.

“I think I can still recognise my mother and father,” Pinki insists.

“My father’s name is Gofur Ali, but I can’t remember the name of my village or district.”

After working as a child labourer at several places and staying as an inmate of the State Home for Women in Jalukbari, Pinki came to Snehalaya three years back.

After all attempts by Snehalaya to reunite Pinki with her family failed, the orphanage now only hopes that some Samaritan will help track the girl’s parents.

“Please help me reach home. Although I am being cared for at Snehalaya, I will not be able to live in peace till I meet my family,” sobbed Pinki.

If Pinki’s roots got lost in years of domestic labour, 14-year-old Devashis Kar — also an inmate of Snehalaya — lost his to a broken marriage.

Devashis’s parents — Sopon and Anu — got separated about eight years ago.

While Devashis went to stay with his father in Panbazar, his mother left with his younger brother Dhona.

After Sopon died last year, members of a voluntary organisation, the Society for Social Transformation and Environment Protection (sSTEP), brought Devashis to Snehalaya.

For the past one year now, Devashis and Snehalaya are trying to find Anu.

All Devashis remembers is that his mother lives somewhere in Lalganesh area of the city.

“I want to go back to my mother. I am not an orphan, so please help me find my mother and brother,” said Devashis, tears welling in his eyes.

“All our attempts to help Pinki and Devashis reunite them with their family members have proved fruitless. So we appeal to one and all to help us in our search to find the parents of both these missing children,” said Father Lukose Cheruvalel, the director of Snehalaya at a news conference in the city.

“We will be glad if someone can help us in our search,” said Father Luckose.

Snehalaya, which has been campaigning for the cause of missing children, has till now reunited around 120 children with guardians across the state.

“Awareness and speedy dissemination of information can help immensely to trace the exact home of missing children. So we want to organise an aggressive awareness campaign about missing children in and around the city,” said another member of the children’s home. In legal parlance, a “missing child” is one who runs away or is lost or trafficked for sexual abuse or exploitation for labour or abducted for ransom, revenge or spite or stolen by childless couples directly or through agents or sold by own parents or by abductors.

Children separated from their parents and guardians, who are looking for them or have given up their search and are clueless regarding the whereabouts of their children can also be considered “missing”.

For now, the job in hand for Snehalaya is to track down the “missing” families of these two children.

Till then, Pinki and Devashis can only wait.