Mumbai: A fortnight after a teenage girl slipped out of her home in Sweden, leaving her distraught family behind, and flew down to Mumbai to meet her Instagram friend in Mumbai, the Crime Branch Unit Six traced her to Chembur, after a Yellow Notice was issued.
She had arrived in the city in the last week of November and was handed over to her father on Friday; he was in the city to pick up his daughter and flew back with her to Sweden. While leaving, he thanked the Mumbai police profusely for a job well done.
The 16-year-old Swedish national, who is in college, met the 18-year-old boy from Chembur in January last year and since then the duo were in constant touch. The girl is the eldest child and her father, Sardar Tomar, is a businessman, the police said.
She bought the air tickets from her scholarship money and flew down to Mumbai on November 27 on a tourist visa.
She met her friend, a resident of Cheeta Camp in Chembur, but since he was staying with his family he could not accommodate her at his place and they rented a flat nearby.
Meanwhile, her father approached the local police, and acting on his complaint, the Skpepparbacken police station in Sweden filed a missing person complaint. Their investigation revealed that she had already flown to India, after which the Swedish authorities issued a Yellow Notice -- a global police alert for a missing person.
Once the crime branch was in the loop, they traced her friend who revealed that she was residing in a one-room-kitchen flat in Subhash Nagar at Cheeta Camp, from where she was taken into custody and sent to children's home in Dongri.
The teenager's father flew to India on Friday and following due verification, her custody was given to him; the officials of the children's home, in turn, counselled the girl and they flew back to Sweden, the police added.
The girl was very happy to see her father; she was also worried as she had subsequently realised that she had made a mistake. In a tweet, Tomar thanked the Mumbai Police and the team of Crime Branch Unit 6, comprising senior inspector Ravindra Salunkhe, inspector Mangalsing Chavhan, API Mira Deshmukh and police Naik Kolelar for their efforts.
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