Watch: 13-year-old reunited with family after 5 years, thanks to Telangana police
It was an emotional reunion between 13-year-old Soni and his parents as they reunited after five long years of searching and separation. A video captures the heartrending moment, which shows the mother crying and fervently hugging Soni. The boy had gone missing when he was just eight years old, in July 2015, from Handia in Allahabad, Uttar Pradesh. It is only now that he could meet his parents, thanks to the efforts of the Telangana police.
The reunion was made possible with Darpan, a facial recognition tool developed by the Telangana police, which found Soni while matching missing children’s photographs with children in various children’s homes.
After Soni went missing from Uttar Pradesh on July 23, 2015, he was spotted by police in Assam’s Golapara and admitted to a local child welfare centre where he has been till now. When the Telangana police found, through Darpan, that this was the same boy who went missing in UP, they informed the Handia police station, who informed Soni's parents. The parents rushed to the concerned CWC in Assam and identified their child. Watch the video here:
Emotional reunion..
— Swati Lakra (@SwatiLakra_IPS) October 9, 2020
A 13 year old autistic boy child who was missing from Uttar Pradesh since 2015 was traced at a child home in Assam after 5 years, by Telangana Police with the help of DARPAN (FacialRecognitionTool) of @TelanganaCOPs #Technology #Darpan pic.twitter.com/hjWtPd9voZ
According to Telangana Police, a separate application developed by them works on photographs of missing persons and FIRs related to children uploaded on CCTNS (Crime and Criminal Tracking Network System) to identify and track them. Darpan has a feature which runs multiple images from one source against another to match photographs of children who are missing with those of children who are lodged at various child welfare and rescue homes across the country. For this, the data of children and people who go missing as well as data of children at child care institutions is stored in the Darpan database.