Cuttack: As two children they were once abandoned by their families, but they have beaten all odds and started a new life in Spain after two couples from the European country adopted them from city-based orphanage Basundhara a few years ago.
Recently, the duo—Laxmi and Sagarika—visited the orphanage that had once given them shelter. The employees and inmates of Basundhara organised a special programme to welcome the two girls.
Basundhara sources claimed that Laxmi’s parents in Paradip area of Jagatsighpur district had left her as a domestic help in the residence of a doctor when she was only nine. She was rescued and brought to the city-based orphanage 1999.
Antonio Tares and Maria Cruise, a couple from Spain, had adopted Laxmi from Bansundhara in 2001 after completing all legal formalities.
Leaving her past behind, Laxmi, who has been renamed as Maria Laxmi by her foster parents, is now working in a television channel in Spain after completing her education.
“I still remember my days at Basundhara. I used to pluck guavas from a tree on the orphanage premises and play with other inmates,” Laxmi said.
Sagarika was rescued by a voluntary organisation in Kendrapara and sent to Basundhara in 2000 when she was only two. Spanish couple Manuel Lope and Maria Luisa had adopted Sagarika in 2008.
She is now studying in school and is known as Sagarika Lope Niyeto.
Both Laxmi and Sagarika admitted that they had faced some discrimination in Spain initially but they overcame the situation subsequently.
“India has simpler adoption laws in comparison to many other countries,” claimed one of Sagarika’s foster parents who accompanied her to Basundhara.