Brazilian couple, who forcibly changed names of inmates at their charitable trust, now absconding

They were children of a 'lesser' god. But even after conversion, their life has not changed.
Shivani, who became Damaris after spending years in the Faridabad-based Comdemat Charitable Trust where her parents sent her in the hope of a better future, is back to square one after the trust owners went missing.
Aldemir De Souza and his wife Darlene, who ran the trust, reportedly fled to Brazil after a number of parents alleged they were forcibly converting their children to Christianity.


WHERE HAVE THEY GONE? Radha Paswan (above), the mother of Anila,
u00a0one of the girls at the trust

Trust caretaker BK Mishra told MiD DAY that repeated efforts to reach the couple in Brazil have not yielded results. "When they left in December last year, Mr De Souza had assured me that they would return by January 10. Meanwhile, MiD DAY broke the story about conversions and ever since I have been unable to reach them," he said.

MiD DAY had reported in December that the trust was allegedly involved in forcible conversions on the pretext of offering good education, free food and accommodation to girls from poor families. When parents of some girls complained that they were not able to trace their children, MiD DAY found that De Souza had got them admitted to a private school in Faridabad with Christian names.

"Once or twice they replied to my mails but neither did they tell me about their whereabouts nor did they divulge their return plans to India. Almost four months have passed and things are going out of hand. I want to quit now. The money which they left with me has been spent and I am broke," Mishra told MiD DAY.

Now the trust administration wants to return the kids but their families are clueless. Pitambar, a taxi driver who had handed over his 10-year-old daughter Shivani to the trust, said, "Without asking me they changed my daughter's name to Damiris and started preaching Christianity. Now they are telling me to take back my daughter. I never imagined they would abandon our children after keeping them for so many years."

The trust's official documents say Aldemir, 37, was a nurse by profession and his wife Darlene, 28, a specialist in child education, childcare and welfare.
In December, in an email message, Darlene had said, "I want to inform you that we are out of India for a surgery. We have all the documents and the parents know everything. We are only in India to help those needy children."
However, they did not revert to fresh emails.