West Bengal Ham operator helps missing Telangana man return home

A Khammam man, who went missing two months ago and surfaced in West Bengal, will soon return home, thanks to a Ham (Amateur Radio) operator and his team.

Khammam: A Khammam man, who went missing two months ago and surfaced in West Bengal, will soon return home, thanks to a Ham (Amateur Radio) operator and his team.

Vemula Venkataswamy, 58, of Ballepalli in Khammam Rural mandal was found roaming at the annual Gangasagar Mela that takes place from January 8 to 17 on Sagar Island, about 100 km south of Kolkata. He was spotted by a team of Ham operators of West Bengal Radio Club led by its secretary Ambarish Nag Biswas, who goes by the Ham Radio call sign, VU2JFA. They were at the mela along with students of Indian Academy of Communication and Disaster Management led by secretary Rinku Nag Biswas providing health, relief services and finding missing persons.

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“We found him asking for food at a tea stall. That is a common indicator of missing persons. So we asked him about his whereabouts. But as he was speech and hearing impaired, we could not retrieve any information at once. As this was a special case, a lengthy exercise had to be done to find his native place,” Biswas told ‘Telangana Today’ on Thursday.

They first offered Venkataswamy food from different parts of the country to know to which State he was from. However, he had all the varieties with the same liking, following which they showed him images of temples from across the country. That was when he identified the Iravendi temple in Burgampahad of Kothagudem and an image of a Rythu Bazaar in Kukatpally of Hyderabad. To further confirm his native place, they showed him images of political leaders from Telangana and he identified CLP leader Bhatti Vikramarka of Khammam.

“The identification he made was ascertained based on the reflexes on his face when we showed him the images. As face is the index of mind, I keenly observed him how he responds to the images shown to him,” Biswas said, adding that his club was specially trained for the purpose.

“He was excited when we showed him an image of a statue of former Chief Minister NT Rama Rao at NTR Circle in Khammam and gestured that he lived close by it. It was by January 30 that we were finally able to crack the code and find where he was from,” he noted.

Biswas then contacted the Khammam Police Commissionerate control room, Commissioner of Police and Raghunathapalem police station and sent Venkataswamy’s photo to find his whereabouts. The Raghunathapalem police then summoned Venkataswamy’s son Rambabu to verify his father’s photo. Biswas spoke to Rambabu with help from Hyderabad-based National Institute of Amateur Radio director Ram Mohan Suri, as Rambabu could speak only Telugu.

The episode is all set to end well with Rambabu along with his brother-in-law Shekhar and a certificate of identification from local corporator M Jagan Mohan Rao leaving for Kakdwip in West Bengal, where Venkataswamy is lodged at the Yogiraj Shyamacharan Sanatan Mission. He will be handed over to his son on Friday in the presence of the local police with Ham operator Dibas Mondal (VU3ZII) coordinating affairs, Biswas said.

When contacted, Rambabu said his father used to disappear from home whenever he was distressed and usually returned after 10 or 15 days.

“He usually goes to Hyderabad, Karimnagar or Bhadrachalam. This is the first time he went out of the State and we are surprised how he travelled to West Bengal,” he said, adding that they had searched for him but did not lodge a missing complaint as it was not unusual for Venkataswamy to disappear for days together.