I am “really worried,” says Majhi's mother

She says he is the sole breadwinner of the family

Her tears kept rolling down when Parbati Majhi spoke to presspersons soon after meeting the mediators who had come down from Hyderabad to facilitate the release of abducted Malkangiri Collector R. Vineel Krishna and her Junior Engineer son Pabitra Majhi here on Sunday.

“I am really worried. You could easily make the pain of a mother in such a situation. My son Pabitra is the lone breadwinner of our family,” Ms. Majhi, the widowed mother of the young tribal engineer said.

“I pleaded before the mediators [Someswar Rao and G. Haragopal] to try for the release of the District Collector and my son, and they told me that both of them were safe and they were trying for the release of the two.”

Ms. Majhi, whose husband died in 1999, has been living in a house that they have built on government land in the Saliasahi slum cluster of the city along with her two other sons who are younger than Mr. Majhi.

Mr. Majhi had passed out from a technical institution in Cuttack and joined government service as a Junior Engineer in Maoist-infested Kudumuluguma Block in Malkangiri district on September 23 last year. The family hails from Chanchabani village in Mayurbhanj in the northern part of Orissa.

Ms. Majhi and her other son were helped by a local journalist to reach the State Guest House where the mediators were holding discussions with top officials of the Orissa government.

Although she had been living in the heart of the Capital city, no official from the State government had visited them yet , she said.