Tragic tale of Shankars

Had the tsunami killed his daughter, Ravi would have been better off. But that was not so. His eight-year-old daughter Apurva was spotted at a relief camp but vanished from there just a few days before he located her. His son died in his arms but his wife survived. It has been four years since then, but not a day goes by when the couple does not pray and cry for their daughter. NIDHI MITTAL brings you their moving storyA cheerful dinner as usual, followed by bed time talks and struggle to put the kids to sleep in time. Things were just the same without any impression of the impending doom that was to haunt this family forever. Ravi Shankar had just woken up when his wife Mamta was preparing the bed tea in the adjoining kitchen. Still on his bed, he felt the ground underneath shake. His wife came out of the kitchen hurriedly. In a few seconds, yet another stronger jerk put the couple on their heels. Alarmed, they woke up their two children. Mamta picked up her year-old son in her arms, while Ravi held eight-year-old Apurva’s hand tightly. The family ran out and sat in the open space outside the house, watching other neighbours doing the same.Still groggy, the children looked around cluelessly. Everyone thought it was a earthquake and things will settle down in a while. Only till the time they saw a man running towards the herd of people shouting “paani aa raha hai, bhaago”. Ravi instantly took Apurva’s hand and climbed a high ramp. A strong tidal wave came and went back washing their feet. In a matter of minutes, the group saw another huge wave building up from a distance, speedily heading towards their side, breaking big coconut trees on its way like reed. Chaos ensued in the midst of which Ravi pushed his family into a truck loaded with tribals running for their lives.Ravi helped his family get in and asked Mamta and Apurva to hold on to the stead tightly. Apurva was on the other side of the truck. Ravi could see the gigantic wave coming like a monster to eat them up. And then it was all water and shouts.This was on December 26, 2004, the most unfortunate day for India when tsunami felled thousands of lives and families, leaving behind it unaccounted orphans.This is not an effort to bring back the terrible tales of sufferers of that natural disaster, but a father’s appeal to who ever can help bring his daughter back.Ravi, a sergeant with the Indian Air Force, and his wife have lived each day full of hopes to find their daughter Apurva and have seen the hope come down crashing at the end of each painful day. That fateful morning when the truck was washed away, everyone went haywire. Ravi didn’t know how to swim. It was a green bamboo log that stuck between his thighs and helped him float.After a few minutes, which seemed like ages, when the water receded, Ravi came up to the runway of the Air Force station in Car-Nicobar where he was posted then. But soon, another monster wave came with its mouth wide open and Ravi held tight to the fencing of the runway wall knowing that this time a log may not come to his help.Water receded again. “Nothing was the same. Everything had split apart, including our lives. I could not find my wife and children. While I was helping a woman, I saw Mamta coming from somewhere in my friend’s car carrying my son in her arms. We immediately took him to the doctor because he was not moving. There were two doctors on the island, one of whom was dead,” recalls Ravi.The doctor told the couple their son was dead, because of taking in excessive water. Doubting his judgement initially, they asked for the medical superintendent's opinion, who confirmed the death. Shattered, the immediate thought of the couple was to look for their daughter.Ravi searched every part of the island but could not trace Apurva. The relief operation then began and they were sent to Tambaram in Chennai where the couple spent three days and then headed for their home in Jamshedpur.“Apart from our grief of losing our son, we were uneasy throughout about our daughter. My wife and I refused to believe that she may be dead because we were hearing tales of people being traced days after the tsunami struck. At that time I heard of a spiritual leader Benny Hinn who had come visiting from a foreign country. I was told he could tell me where my daughter was,” says Ravi.Immediately, he set off for Bangalore where he could not meet the man because “he was busy with the big people like Ministers who frequently visited him for advice.” Not losing hope, Ravi went back to Car-Nicobar on January 25, 2005. But he could not stay there even for a single second. The horrifying sight of the island just a month back flashed before his eyes. “A sudden fear struck me. I came back in the same plane I had gone there,” says Ravi in a chocked voice.He then headed straight to Port Blair with his daughter’s photo where two more people in search of their children joined him. “Then I felt a little encouraged. Otherwise, wherever I went, no one was interested in my problem because everyone had lost someone or the other. These two men shared the same emotions, so it was a boost,” he says.Something at Port Blair rekindled hope in Ravi. At a relief camp, he met at least three people who told him that they had lived in a relief camp with his daughter. That was a big camp from where they had been sent to this one. Thanking God for this stroke of luck, Ravi rushed to the big relief camp but all he found there was gaping emptiness. People from that camp had been dispersed to several other smaller camps. With no clue about where to look for his daughter now, Ravi went back to the first camp which was run by spiritual master Sri Sri Ravi Shankar’s followers.“While telling me that they had no idea where Apurva was, those people suggested that I join their ‘art of living’ classes which would calm me down. I looked at them in disbelief and disgust and came back without uttering another word. There I was dying to locate my missing daughter, and these frauds were telling me to join some stupid classes,” he says.Back to square one again, a helpless Ravi decided to return. He did not think of taking his case to higher authorities or registering it with IAF’s complaint department because he knew no one would come out to help him. “My friend Venkataraman, a senior sergeant, had also lost his son. He had all the proof that his son was alive. He wrote to everyone from the President of India to the IAF chief to police authorities, but no one helped him find his son,” says Ravi.Venkataraman’s 12-year-old son was tracked to the Nirmala School relief camp in Port Blair. When he reached there, the caretaker Phoolkumari told him that the child had been in her camp, but his maternal uncle had taken him away. She said they didn’t feel the need to note his address or check his credentials. Since that day, no one knows where the boy is.Ravi had joined duty at Car-Nicobar on June 16, 2004. His family joined him just a month-and-a-half before the tsunami struck on November 4, 2004. Mamta now curses the day they stepped on that fateful land, obviously ignoring the fact that the monstrous tsunami had hit many other land masses too.“My children had just started making friends and were getting used to the lifestyle there. Apurva is a reserved girl. She talks less and makes less friends,” she says with a worried look. Apurva was a shy eight-year-old who loved spending time alone with her mother at home and this is what worries Mamta the most. “I don’t know how she would be managing. She can’t even interact with people,” she says.Life has been no less than a hell for Ravi and Mamta since then. Knowing that their daughter has survived that deadly disaster and that they missed reaching her only by a few days, Ravi and Mamta have not spent a day without weeping and wishing the worst away from their missing daughter.However, hope keeps coming back to the aggrieved couple, leaving them more hurt everytime. Something similar happened, when in 2005 Ravi’s friend in Pune, Ms Grace, told his grievous story to Shashi Brother, a man with supernatural powers.“She asked Brother about my daughter and he said she is alive and will soon come back to us. He even described her precisely as if he could see her. He also told them what clothes she was wearing that night, which no one else except us know! After hearing all this I started believing in him,” says Ravi, adding that he has still not met the man but keeps talking to him on phone. Only a few days back Brother insisted that Apurva would return but admitted that he had no information about her whereabouts.Apart from emotional upheavals, the struggle for searching their daughter has cost them dear. Ravi visits Chennai almost every year to place advertisements for Apurva in leading newspapers “because someone suggested this was the best way to get to her if she was still in that State.”Placing an ad in top dailies like New Indian Express and Dinamani has cost Ravi Rs 12,000 per insert. Besides bearing the cost burden Ravi is also risking his job as, being in defence service, “people are not allowed to reveal their identity publicly in such a way”. Ravi was warned by Venkataraman who was issued a warning by the department for coming on news channels to appeal for his son.Keeping up with their struggle to find their daughter, the couple is doing everything to not remind them of their disaster. Ravi’s wife has taken up a job with the CSD canteen to keep herself engaged. The couple now also wants to have another child but has not been able to owing to medical complication emanating from emotional stress.Now posted in Delhi, the day starts for Ravi and Mamta with the thought of Apurva and tears in their eyes. “We don’t have many visitors. So, whenever the door or phone bell rings, it seems someone has finally located my daughter. I go running towards the door but nothing happens,” says Mamta with tears in her eyes.Gradually getting disillusioned with the entire system, Ravi, at times, wishes Apurva had died in that wave. “Sometimes I think it would have been better if she died and we found her body. At least we would know she is no more. Now that we know she is alive, we die each day wondering what could be happening to her. Shivers run down our spines thinking about the worse,” says Ravi in a choked voice.One of Ravi’s friends has put out an e-mail describing his case and asking everyone to keep forwarding it with hope that it may reach the right person some day. Though getting her back is what they want, a hapless Ravi wants to put out a request that he “at least wants to see her once.”Ravi Shankar’s mobile number is 9868763263. Foray got the story though one such e-mail.

Published in The Pioneer on February 15, 2009