A wealthy man used to visit his daughter’s grave every weekend. Then one day, a poor little girl came, pointed toward the gravestone, and casually said, “Uncle… that woman used to live near my house.” The man ran after the girl, and when he found out the truth, he was shaken to his core…
Aditya, a wealthy businessman from Kashmir, had been visiting his daughter’s grave in the village cemetery every weekend for the past three years.
His daughter, ten-year-old Priya, had died in a strange car accident. The driver had fled the scene without leaving any trace. Since then, Aditya had been living like a homeless soul.
One afternoon, as he was dusting the marble tomb, a thin little girl, her face smeared with dirt and holding a piece of dry bread, stood at a distance and pointed toward the grave:
“Uncle… she used to live near my house. She would always stand under the mango tree by the river, and she never spoke to anyone.”
Aditya’s heart raced:
“You… you saw her so clearly?”
“Yes, I saw her every day. She wore a white salwar and stood under the mango tree behind my house.”
Aditya quickly grabbed the little girl’s hand:
“Take me there, quickly!”
When they arrived, Aditya was stunned. It was a dilapidated hut by the Ganga riverbank. Behind it was an old mango tree near the water. But what shocked him most was the faded painting hanging above the door—a little girl in a white salwar, her eyes filled with deep sadness.
“This painting… where did it come from?” His voice trembled.
The little girl lowered her head. “She gave it to me… and then disappeared.”
A poor woman came out of the hut and invited him inside. After hearing the story, she whispered:
“I have seen that child by the river for more than a year. People say it’s just an illusion, but I know she’s real. She stood there, pale, as if waiting for someone… and I realized, in the sunlight, she had no shadow.”
Aditya fainted.
The woman opened an old wooden box: “Three years ago, I found this floating in the river. Afraid of poverty and trouble, I didn’t have the courage to take it to the police station.”
Inside the box were: a silver bracelet engraved with a peacock—the mark of Priya, a torn piece of white salwar fabric, and a DNA test result from a private clinic in Delhi. Its corner was torn, but the name was still clearly visible: Aditya.
Aditya’s face went pale, and his eyes turned red.
“Priya… you’ve been searching for your home for three years… and I… I have been standing before an empty grave all this time…”
It turned out that after the accident, another girl in a white salwar had been mistaken for Priya. The real Priya had drifted in the river and become trapped on this riverbank.
The poor little girl asked softly:
“Uncle… will you take her home? She said she’s very cold…”
Aditya covered his face as warm tears fell to the ground. He realized that thanks to the kindness of the poor people living by the sacred river, his daughter’s soul had finally found peace.