School logo on T-shirt helps cops crack missing child case

The boy was found crying alone near a tea stall around 4 pm by Police Naik Avinash Misal, who was on foot patrol. According to police, the child was unable to tell officers his name or address and could only utter the words “Amma” and “Abba”

MUMBAI: An eight-year-old boy with special needs, who wandered nearly 1.5 km away from his home in Jogeshwari East on Thursday, was reunited with his family within two hours after a police constable traced his identity using the logo on his Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) school T-shirt.

The boy was found crying alone near a tea stall around 4 pm by Police Naik Avinash Misal, who was on foot patrol. According to police, the child was unable to tell officers his name or address and could only utter the words “Amma” and “Abba”.

Senior police inspector Iqbal Shikalgar said Misal noticed the words “Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation Hindi School, Jogeshwari East, Mumbai” printed on the child’s T-shirt and immediately visited the school. There, teacher Laksh Kumar Nandeshwar informed him that although the boy no longer studied there, the uniform had been issued during his admission and the school’s records contained details of his family.

The records also showed that the child was now studying at Sopan Special English Medium School. Misal contacted the school, where teacher Neha Tendulkar identified the boy and shared his parents’ details, enabling police to quickly trace the family.

Police said the child had slipped out of his house in the Bandra Plot area of Meghwadi while his mother was occupied in the kitchen.

His father, Riyaz Ahmed Akbar Ali Ansari, said his son Shahbaz had gone missing around 3 pm while playing outside. “We looked for him everywhere in the locality but could not find him and were about to go to the police station when we got the good news that Misal had found him,” said Ansari.