IT WAS celebration time for the Lone family: their son Ghulam Hassan Lone was getting married. But 10 days before the wedding, festivities turned into gloom when Hassan was picked up allegedly by security forces.

Native of a remote picturesque village, Murran in Tangmarg, Hassan was working as a waiter at the New Light Hotel in Sopore. It was just the beginning of insurgency in Kashmir and Hassan, says his family, was loitering outside his hotel. "He was picked up by security forces from there," says father Ghulam Ahmad Lone, " He was still in his hotel uniform."

The family says they were still hopeful that Hassan would be found in time for his wedding. So they approached the security forces. "We couldn't locate him despite our best efforts," says Hassan's father.

It was just the beginning of a search that was not to seen an end even in 17 years.

"We searched everywhere in the Valley...in jails, security camps and interrogation centres, but didn't see any success," says his father.

Ghulam Ahmed Lone says the search for his son took him as far as Karnataka. "Somebody told me he was lodged in a jail in Karnataka. There was a dead end waiting for me there too," he says.

Back in the Valley, the family says civic authorities did little to help trace Hassan. "I met all top officers in the state...ministers, politicians, top bureaucrats...They promised me help but it never reached us," says Hassan's father.

"We want to know whether he is alive of dead. If he is alive let us meet him and if he is dead we want to give him a decent burial," says the family.