He also admits that he may have been afraid of failure.Īfter Saroo graduates from college, he gets a job with his father’s business, which sells equipment such as industrial hoses, fittings, valves and pumps. He gives up due to the limitations of the technology available, the hugeness of the task and his preoccupation with college. He uses Google Earth to survey areas with names similar to the ones he called home as a child. This reignites his interest in finding his Indian family. When Saroo goes to college, he meets Indian students. Saroo’s adopted parents don’t push him to tell his story too soon and understand when he brings up his biological family. Saroo thinks of his family in India often, but it takes him a while to tell anyone his story. Saroo grows older, discovering a passion for sports and working hard to be successful in high school. Mantosh has spent longer in Liluah, the juvenile home that Saroo stayed in, and was more scarred by the experience. Saroo is eager to please, but Mantosh is initially loud and disobedient. His parents adopt another child from India, Mantosh. They treat Saroo well, taking him on family vacations and being patient with him as he adjusts to a new culture. Saroo’s Australian parents have a passion for adoption and give other families advice on adoption. For example, Saroo is upset when he sees his mom putting beef in the refrigerator and protests when his mother drives him somewhere, implying that he is not accustomed to women driving. Saroo adapts well to life in Australia but sometimes struggles to cope with how the culture works. An Australian family adopts him when he is 6. When ISSA and the police fail to find Saroo’s family, he is put up for adoption. At Nava Jeevan, the orphanage run by ISSA, Saroo is treated well and fed more regularly. Sood, who arranges his adoption, tells Saroo that she is going to try to find his home and family. Saroo is taken to a juvenile detention center where he is bullied and beaten, before being sent to an orphanage run by the Indian Society for Sponsorship and Adoption (ISSA). He wishes he could remember the young man’s name. Saroo mistrusts the police, but does not run away. He then takes Saroo to the police to find his family. A teenager Saroo meets on the streets takes Saroo to his family, and Saroo stays with them for several days. After Saroo fails to come when called, the mother throws a rock at him and quickly abandons him. He is chased by his host but escapes.Ī boy and his mother, who are strangers to Saroo, briefly take him in. At his next opportunity, Saroo runs away. Nothing happens, but Saroo senses that the man is dangerous. The man has Saroo lie down next to him on a bed. The railway worker brings a man to his shack that he says will help Saroo. When Saroo is wandering around the rail yards, he meets a railway worker who shelters and feeds him for a couple of days. Saroo is attacked by a gang of young men, but escapes them. He almost drowns in a river twice, but is saved by the same homeless man both times. Saroo loves playing in the water but cannot swim. He has difficulty communicating with anyone and has to scavenge, steal and beg for food. After children in the station begin being kidnapped and a train almost hits Saroo, he decides to take to the streets of Calcutta. Saroo begins to sleep at the end of a train platform with other orphaned children. For days he sneaks aboard random trains, but they always return to the same station in Calcutta. He receives little help and is too distrustful of the police to ask them for help. He does not speak well, cannot read and does not know the name or location of his hometown. He speaks Hindi, not Bengali, which is the main language in Calcutta. Much later, the carriage doors open, and Saroo enters Calcutta. When he awakes, the carriage doors are closed, the train is moving, and he is trapped. He thinks that Guddu will find him and falls asleep again. He boards the train and realizes that no one is in the carriage. He is worried that the train will pull out, and he will be left alone. ![]() Confused, Saroo wonders if Guddu is on the train. Saroo falls asleep and awakes to see a train in front of him. Saroo is told to wait on a bench as Guddu scavenges for food and coins around the train platform. They sneak aboard a train near their home and exit onto a station in a place Saroo calls Berampur. ![]() When he is 5, Saroo convinces his older brother Guddu to take him to the train station. He steals food with his brothers and cares for his sister. Saroo’s mother struggles to earn enough to feed and shelter her four children, so they are almost always hungry. When Saroo’s father leaves his mother, money is scarce. Saroo was born in India to a Hindu mother and a Muslim father.
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