E-Paper
Girl who fled home to avoid marriage found at Anand Vihar ISBT
Four years after a minor girl left her uncle’s home in Delhi as she was not ready for early marriage and wanted to study further, the Delhi Police crime branch on Tuesday said they had found her at the Anand Vihar interstate bus terminal (ISBT), where she had come from Bihar
Four years after a minor girl left her uncle’s home in Delhi as she was not ready for early marriage and wanted to study further, the Delhi Police crime branch on Tuesday said they had found her at the Anand Vihar interstate bus terminal (ISBT), where she had come from Bihar.
The woman, now aged 21, had gone to her grandmother’s home in Bihar’s Samastipur after she left her uncle’s house in 2017. She had been living with her grandmother and completed her Class 12 while neither her family members nor the police had ever searched her there since she went missing. In 2019, the city police had declared a reward of R50,000 for providing information to find her, said deputy commissioner of police (crime) Bhisham Singh.
DCP Singh said that the girl’s missing complaint was filed in 2017 at the Shalimar Bagh police station, where a case of kidnapping was registered and an investigation was initiated. “Our team was also working on the case. Investigators contacted and examined the girl’s relatives and friends. Recently, we learnt about her whereabouts in Bihar. We were planning to send a team there when it was leant that she had left for Delhi,” said Singh.
On Monday, the DCP said, the team received information that the woman would reach Anand Vihar bus terminal in a bus. Accordingly, a team reached there and found her. She was unaware of her missing case and that the police had been searching her. The woman told the police that her parents died when she was a child. She along with her brother started living with her maternal uncle in Delhi.
“When she was in Class 10, her maternal uncle was forcing her to marry a person of his choice. But she did not want to marry as she was interested in further studies. In May 2017, she left her maternal uncle’s house without telling anyone and reached her maternal grandmother’s house in Samastipur district, Bihar,” he said.
None of the relatives visited her maternal grandmother’s house and her maternal grandmother also did not inform anyone about her stay and supported her in pursuing her studies. She completed her school education and took admission in a nursing course in Samastipur, the DCP said.
The woman was handed over to the Shalimar Bagh police for further legal action.
Ends
