Government to arrange train journey for Geeta to help search parents

Government will arrange for Geeta, the deaf and mute girl who returned to India last October after accidentally landing in Pakistan several years ago, to undertake a train journey after the summer to help search her parents.

External affairs minister Sushma Swaraj had initiated an effort in cooperation with Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar under which Geeta's photograph was sent to all police stations in the state, after which some communications had come from there but the girl had rejected them seeing the photographs, MEA spokesperson Vikas Swarup said.

He said Geeta has suggested that she could travel to Bihar and Jharkhand by train so that she could identify her native place through rail stations as she remembers the station that was nearby to her residence.

"The external affairs minister has taken up the issue with the railway minister and we expect that after this summer season, we will be able to arrange for her travel. We hope she will be invited by the railway ministry as a guest for the journey during which there will be an assistant and interpreter with her," the Spokesperson said.

Meanwhile, he said Geeta was very happy in an Indore institution where she was learning skills to be self-reliant. "She is very happy with the skill development training," he said.