TikTok might be insanely popular in India but it has never been without controversies, especially in the recent past. Just last week, it bore the brunt of queerphobic digs in YouTuber CarryMinati's infamous YouTube vs TikTok video, became notorious for allowing videos by users propagating misogyny and sexism circulate on the platform, and had Indian masses give low ratings to the app to get it banned. But amid all these controversies, a TikTok video recently helped in reuniting a family with their missing father.

R. Venkateshwarlu, a man who had been missing for over two years, was found 2,000 kilometers away from his home in the southern state of Telangana, through a Punjab cop’s TikTok video. Venkateshwarlu, who has hearing and speech difficulties, was employed as a labourer in Telangana. In April 2018, he got on a truck to go to another village for work. Due to a series of mishaps, which included being stranded in the middle of the road by a truck driver and subsequently hitchhiking on a vehicle that ended up going in the opposite direction, Venkateshwarlu ended up in Ludhiana and living on food donations from the local people.

Ajaib Singh, a police constable in Ludhiana with over 800,000 followers on TikTok, had been uploading videos of himself donating food and other necessities to the vulnerable people of the community. In a lucky coincidence, he uploaded a video in March of him donating food to a man, who a friend of the family recognised as Venkateshwarlu.

The friend informed the family, who got in touch with the Ludhiana police. The police then tracked the man and helped in connecting him to the family. "We both burst into tears when we first saw each other,” said his son R Peddiraju, to BBC. “He asked me to come and take him home, signalling in his own way."

Despite the movement restrictions, Peddiraju managed to get a permit to travel across the states, and within a week, was in Ludhiana with his father. "This is the first time that our father stayed away from us for this long. He lived only on rotis for the last two years, which he was not used to," added Peddiraju. "The first thing we'll do now is feed him homemade hot rice."

In the past too, TikTok has lent a hand in reuniting families. In July 2019, a woman found her ‘missing’ husband in a TikTok video. In February last year as well, TikTok helped a family find their daughter who had been ‘missing’ for three years.

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