Edited by Deepali Verma
Separation and reuniting story of Amy Khvitia and Ano Sartania is no less than a Bollywood movie. The identical twins, who got separated at birth, hail from Eastern European country of Georgia and had been unknowingly residing just miles apart there. Both found each other via a talent show.
Their story came to light via BBC which showcases a much larger issue plaguing Georgia, that is, the alarming number of babies stolen from hospitals and sold over the decades; a scandal that still is overarchingly unresolved.
The journey to discovery for Amy and Ano started when they were mere 12 years old. Amy, engrossed in her favourite TV show, ‘Georgia’s Got Talent’, came across a girl dancing who carried an uncanny resemblance to her. Amy had no idea that the woman dancing was her long-lost sister.
Meanwhile, Ano received a TikTok video featuring a woman with blue hair who had the looks incredibly similar to her. The woman featuring in the video turned out to be her twin Amy. Aza Shoni, the twins’ birth mother, slipped into a coma due to undisclosed birth complications in 2002. This led husband Gocha Gakharia to make a devastating decision – to sell Ano and Amy to separate families.
Ano was raised in Tbilisi, while Amy grew up in Zugdidi, both oblivious to each other’s existence. Irrespective of their participation in the same dance contest at the age of 11, where the audience noticed the striking resemblance, the truth remained elusive.
Their lives proceeded on parallel paths until the fateful TikTok video and subsequent reunion. However, when the twins sought answers to their own separation, they found themselves exposed to a shocking reality. They happened to be just two among thousands of babies stolen from Georgian hospitals and sold, with cases reported as recently as 2005.
In accordance with the BBC report, the incident happened two years ago on the Rustaveli Bridge in Tbilisi, Georgia’s capital, where Amy and Ano met for the very first time after their separation 19 years earlier.
