Even after decades of living without ever having known his birth mother, the umbilical cord of a Dutch gentleman of Indian origin, remains unsevered and intact, in a metaphorical sense at least. And that perhaps explains his unending quest to find her, even after four decades of unfruitful searching
Childhood traumas never go away altogether. Instead, they either tend to linger on, retreating within the multi-layered folds of the subconscious human mind. Or to perhaps recede into the far corners of memory as distant and unfathomable dreams that pose questions, seek answers.
Among these, one that jolts adults suddenly, is when the reality hits them that they are an adopted ofspring of foster parents and not their biological children. And then the cascading flurry of questions of “how” and “why” and “where” begin to haunt them with nagging persistence.
Nagpur-born Dutch Mayor still searches for his biological mother even after four decades.
One such case concerns a Dutch Mayor, who has returned to Nagpur to continue efforts to trace his biological mother more than four decades after he was abandoned as a newborn at a city shelter.
Falgun Binnendijk, currently the Mayor of Heemstede in the Netherlands, was left at the Matru Sewa Sangh, Nagpur, a shelter for abandoned children and women, when he was just three days old.
Official records maintained at the shelter in Nagpur state he was born on February 10, 1985, to a 21-year-old unmarried woman.
Three days later on February 13, 1985, the child was left at the shelter where he remained for about a month before being legally adopted by a couple from the Netherlands.
A nurse at the shelter named him ‘Falgun’, the name of his birth month in the Hindu calendar.
Falgun has said he was always aware he was an adopted child while growing up in the Netherlands as his foster parents never hid the fact from him.
He made his first visit to India as a tourist in 2006 and the experience prompted questions about his origins, particularly because people frequently addressed him in Hindi, assuming he was Indian.
Again in 2017, Falgun returned to Nagpur with the specific aim of locating his biological mother. Then, the Matru Sewa Sangh staff were able to provide a few details, including his date of birth and his mother’s name. However, as there was no address of his birth mother, the search came to a dead end.
Upon his return to the Netherlands, Falgun married, had four children and entered public life. He was eventually elected Mayor of Heemstede, located near Amsterdam. Despite these developments, he said the search for his birth mother remained unresolved.
In August 2024, Falgun again travelled to Nagpur with renewed efforts to trace his origins. Local officials, including municipal commissioner Abhijeet Chaudhari and district collector Vipin Itankar, assisted him by facilitating access to available records. Yet, the search initially yielded no results.
A breakthrough came in December 2025, when district administration officials traced a retired nurse who had been working at the Matru Sewa Sangh at the time Falgun was admitted there as an infant.
Falgun met the nurse during his visit who confirmed that she was the person who had named him at birth.
He said the nurse was able to remember incidents from that time, including details about his admission to the shelter. The meeting was made possible by Vinod Jadhav, a senior district official
On his most recent visit to Nagpur along with his wife and four children, Falgun told media persons he held no grievance against his biological mother.
He stated that his intention was simply to meet her and tell her that he has lived a stable life and that everything had turned out well.
During his most recent visit, Falgun was accompanied by his wife and four children.
He said his wish to meet his birth mother stems from a deep desire to personally tell her that that he bears no ill feelings against her and has led a good life. Proof of that is the fact that he had named one of his daughters after his biological mother.
Falgun plans to return to Nagpur again sometime next year, to continue with his search.
