As a 4-year-old boy, he was lost on an unfamiliar street in Mumbai, struggling to piece together memories of his family. Found by the police, he was placed in a children’s home—confused, displaced, and questioning his very existence. Thirty years later, that same boy—now Dr Aditya Charegaonkar working as a grant manager at the Azim Premji Foundation in Bangalore—still searches for his true identity and the family he lost. As he fights the “system” that he believes can prevent children like him from becoming orphans, his battle remains deeply personal.

At the beginning of 1995, Aditya, who still remembers his family calling him `Sunny`, was separated from his grandmother. It remains one of his most vivid memories, followed by the police sending him to the Mankhurd-based Children’s Aid Society and later to Asha Sadan rescue home.