17-year-old girl, gone missing in 2013 Kedarnath floods, reunited with family

In a fairytale ending of a real-life story, a 17-year-old, mentally challenged girl, who had gone missing in Kedarnath during 2013 deluge there, has been reunited with her family in Aligarh after five years. Elated over the return of their long-lost grand-daughter Chanchal, her grandparents Harish Chand and Shakuntla Devi, residents of Bannadevi locality in Aligarh, said, "This reunion is nothing short of a miracle."

Chanchal had gone to Kedarnath on a pilgrimage with her parents when the tragedy struck, sweeping away her father, while her mother returned home after sometime, Harish Chand told media persons on Monday. Chanchal, then 12, was feared dead but some good samaritans handed her over to an orphanage in Jammu, said director Gyanendra Mishra of NGO Childline Aligarh which helped in bringing the girl home.

For the last few months, the orphanage management had been observing that the girl often tried to communicate something about Aligarh city through her limited verbal skills, Mishra said.

They somehow got in touch with Aligarh city legislator Sanjiv Raja who then took Mishra's assistance. Mishra, in turn, managed to identify the family of the lost girl with the help of police, and restored her to it.

Chachal still misses her long-lost father Rajesh and keeps remembering him, Harish Chand said.