Rare reunion: Pingla Ghar inmate returns home

Aakanksha N Bhardwaj

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, July 5

Amid camera flashes at Pingla Ghar, Suresh Kumar maintained his poise. A middle-aged man with grey hair, donning a clean-shaven look with pink kurta and white pyjama, he stood with a calm demeanour as his teary-eyed family members hugged him, making sure they were not in a dream. He was being united with them after ten years.

It was a different day at Pingla Ghar. The rising sun on Wednesday had brought immense joy for inmates and officials here. It is very rare that inmates of the Home see reunion of patients with their families.

However, Suresh Kumar was not always the same. He was handed over to the Pingla Ghar nearly three years ago by the Jalandhar police. When doctors here saw him for the first time, he was violent, had long hair and beard and was suffering from mental illness. “He had left his home nearly ten years ago and in 2014, he came in contact with us. I do not have photographs of him when he first came here. If anybody had seen him then, he won’t be able to recognise him now. He used to attack other inmates and was totally a different man,” said Dr Raj Kumar, who took care of Kumar. After getting the doctor’s treatment, Kumar started becoming normal and told him about his home at Rupana village in Muktsar.

The doctor still recalls when he had called Kumar’s wife in Muktsar with the help of the Muktsar police. “We told the family a few days ago about Suresh and at first, his wife didn’t believe me, but when I confirmed her sons’ names, she started weeping on the phone, she was so emotional to talk,” the doctor told.

His wife, Rani who works as a domestic help, was ecstatic receiving her husband today. She said she had lost all hope of his return. Rani said Suresh had left home as he was mentally ill for long. “My sons were very small when he left. They too have become emotional on seeing their father,” told Rani, her eyes fixed on his husband. “I have been working for long. I will continue to work even now. I just want my husband to be in front of me always, I do not want anything else,” said Rani while breaking into tears. Her sons, Sagar Kumar (21) and Badal (16) did not have words to explain their feelings. “I do not know what should I say, all I can say is when someone loses hope of getting something and then get it, that feeling can never be replaced by anything else,” said Sagar said the family had thought that his father was dead.

Suresh Kumar then bid adieu to the Pingla Ghar and his friends who wait endlessly their families.