Belgian trekker says India legal battle kept him from dying mother

In June 2024, Belgian trekker and Chennai-based activist Peter Van Geit lost his 93-year-old mother, Irena Van Goethem. She died in Belgium, where Van Geit had wanted to be with her during her final years.Instead, he says, he was in India, after years of legal proceedings stemming from a 2018 trekking expedition that ended in a devastating forest fire in Tamil Nadu.“Mom, 93 years, dies alone. Her only son stuck in India,” Van Geit wrote in an Instagram carousel recently, recounting the events that, according to him, kept him away from his mother for years.His post is a chronological account of what he describes as a six-year legal and personal ordeal- beginning with the Kurangani forest fire, followed by an arrest warrant, five weeks on the run, a confiscated passport and repeated court appearances, before the Supreme Court eventually quashed the criminal proceedings against him.From trekking club to tragedyVan Geit…