Friends and stu­dents of miss­ing re­al es­tate busi­ness­man and tu­tor Lin­wald Be­har­ry held a can­dle­light vig­il in San Fer­nan­do on Sun­day night to pray for his safe re­turn.

Last Mon­day was the last time Be­har­ry was seen. How­ev­er, he had re­port­ed­ly com­mu­ni­cat­ed with peo­ple on his cell phone the fol­low­ing morn­ing.

While the An­ti-Kid­nap­ping Squad, po­lice of­fi­cers from the Moru­ga Po­lice Sta­tion and Val­lence Ramb­harat’s Hunters Search and Res­cue Team have been search­ing for him, his where­abouts re­mained un­known last evening.

Be­har­ry’s black Mer­cedes-Benz Sedan is al­so miss­ing.

Gath­ered in front of the Cross Cross­ing Cen­tre, where his of­fice is lo­cat­ed, the group prayed that God would guide the search teams in lo­cat­ing him and “bring to the light” any­one who may be in­volved in his dis­ap­pear­ance. En­ter­tain­er Leon Coldero re­called he spoke to Be­har­ry last Mon­day. Coldero said they are for­mer school­mates and have a friend­ship that spans more than 40 years.

De­scrib­ing Be­har­ry as a won­der­ful and kind-heart­ed per­son, he said, “I can­not think straight. My head is not in the right place be­cause it keeps haunt­ing me and both­er­ing me as to what could have hap­pened.

I’m just lost for words, there is noth­ing else I can say at this point in time oth­er than hav­ing faith and hop­ing that some mir­a­cle will hap­pen that Lin­wald is fine, that he is okay wher­ev­er he may be and that he will be with us again as soon as pos­si­ble.”

Aamir Ali, one of Be­har­ry’s stu­dents, said he shared a spe­cial re­la­tion­ship with them.

“I know def­i­nite­ly he would want you all to con­tin­ue on the path that he put you on and Lin­wald is not lost he will nev­er be lost,” Ali said.

He said Be­har­ry al­so taught them about in­tegri­ty, com­pas­sion and em­pa­thy. Ali claimed Be­har­ry had sent text mes­sages on Tues­day, but he did not dis­close any fur­ther de­tails.

An­oth­er stu­dent Shinelle Bai­joo said Be­har­ry was more than just a teacher, he was al­so a mo­ti­va­tor, a fa­ther fig­ure, a “broth­er from an­oth­er moth­er” and a men­tor.

She said he did not on­ly teach them the pro­fes­sion of re­al es­tate but al­so life lessons.

Bai­joo said they are all wait­ing to cel­e­brate Be­har­ry’s 62nd birth­day with him on April 11.

Be­har­ry’s friend Yus­suf Ho­sein said while he ap­peared very so­phis­ti­cat­ed be­hind the façade, he is a down-to-earth, help­ful per­son and an in­spi­ra­tion to many.

Ho­sein added, “If any­one can pull them­selves out of this, it is Lin­wald. He has the gift of God. He is very ex­pe­ri­enced, he served in the army as some­one men­tioned.”

Wish­ing that his friend is found soon, Pe­ter Forde said, “A won­der­ful guy. I haven’t come across any­body so far that has not been so great in my books in terms of every­thing,” he said.

Po­lice said the last time any­one saw Be­har­ry was at 10.30 pm on March 25. An­oth­er re­port stat­ed that Be­har­ry of Moru­ga was last seen at his of­fice.

Any­one with in­for­ma­tion on Be­har­ry’s where­abouts is asked to call the Moru­ga Po­lice Sta­tion at 656-7030, any po­lice sta­tion, 800-TIPS or con­tact the po­lice hot­lines at 555, 999, and 911.