Plainsboro woman still waiting for return of children abducted by her ex-husband (VIDEO)

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Bindu Philips of Plainsboro testifies before a House Foreign Affairs subcommittee on March 25. (Jonathan D. Salant | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com)

WASHINGTON — Bindu Philips of Plainsboro flew with her twin boys and her then-husband to his native India in December 2008 on what was supposed to be a family vacation. She hasn't seen them since.

In India, she said, she was abused by her husband, Sunii Jacobs, and family, and then separated from her sons. She was forced to return to the U.S. empty-handed.

"Every day I awaken to the heart-wrenching reality that I'm separated from the children that I love more than anything in this world," Philips told a U.S. House Foreign Affairs subcommittee hearing today. "I am here because I can no longer fight the good fight on my own."

The hearing was called by U.S. Rep. Chris Smith (R-4th Dist.), the subcommittee chairman. Smith is the author of the Sean and David Goldman Child Abduction Prevention and Return Act, named after a Tinton Falls son and father.

David Goldman spent five years trying to get his son, Sean, back after his then-wife took him to her native Brazil in 2005 when their child was 4. She divorced him overseas and then remarried. She died during childbirth and Goldman finally won custody in 2009 after a dozen trips to Brazil, sometimes with court orders in hand.

President Obama signed the bill into law Aug. 8. It requires the State Department to take a series of actions, leading up to the suspension of foreign aid, if a country that signed the Hague Abduction Convention does not return a child abducted by the non-custodial spouse within 12 months.

Philips since has been granted sole custody of her children, but they remain in India and she is not able to talk to them. One year, she bought an advertisement in a local Indian newspaper to wish them happy birthday.

Smith told State Department Ambassador Susan Jacobs, special adviser for children's issues, to use the sanctions in the Goldman Act to pressure India and other countries to give back the abducted children.

"Take her case," Smith told Jacobs, referring to Philips. "Until we do sanctions they'll think this is a paper tiger."

"We will do everything we can to resolve all the cases, to help every left-behind parent," Jacobs said. "You have my commitment."

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Jonathan D. Salant may be reached at jsalant@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @JDSalant. Find NJ.com Politics on Facebook.

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