10-year-old missing girl found alive after 17 years in Karachi
A woman, identified as Kiran, is reunited with her family in Karachi after 17 years. File photo
A woman, identified as Kiran, is reunited with her family in Karachi after 17 years. File photo
KARACHI (Web Desk): A young woman, identified as Kiran, has been reunited with her family in Karachi, 17 years after she first went missing from Islamabad as a child.

The young woman, now 27, recalled that she was only 10 years old when she went out to buy ice cream in Islamabad and got lost. She was first taken to the Edhi Centre in Islamabad and was later shifted to Karachi under the care of Bilquis Edhi. For nearly two decades, her father, Abdul Majeed, searched desperately, eventually fearing he might never see his daughter again.

Sabah Faisal Edhi, the current Chairperson of the Edhi Foundation, stated that the organization made several unsuccessful attempts to trace Kiran’s family over the years. During her long stay at the center, Kiran received educational and religious schooling and also learned essential household skills like cooking and sewing, which helped her stay hopeful when she thought she would never return home.

The emotional reunion only happened after the police provided information leading to Kiran’s identity verification. Her father, Abdul Majeed, expressed immense joy, calling the recovery and reunion after such a long time "truly a miracle."

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According to the Edhi Centre, Kiran is the fifth missing girl from Karachi whose family has been successfully traced. Notably, Safe City Punjab played a key role in providing the information and technology that eventually connected Kiran with her loved ones, highlighting the effectiveness of modern surveillance and data systems in solving old missing person cases.

This extraordinary case highlights the crucial role that both dedicated charitable organizations like the Edhi Foundation and advanced technological systems like Safe City Punjab play in locating missing persons. While the long separation is tragic, the successful reunion after 17 years offers a strong message of hope for the families of other missing children.