The police in Hyderabad busted an child trafficking racket and rescued babies from a gang that would 'sell' them to couples who did not have children of their own in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh.
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Acting on a tip, the police on May 28 arrested 11 people for interstate child trafficking and rescued at least 13 babies in Hyderabad.
While the babies have been handed over to the state's Women and Child Development department, those who had 'purchased' the babies are now worried who will take care of them, as per a report in The Indian Express.
The police in Hyderabad busted an child trafficking racket and rescued babies from a gang that would 'sell' them to couples who did not have children of their own in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh.
During investigation, it was revealed that they got the babies from three people in Delhi and Pune. Nearly 50 babies were supplied to them, who in turn sold them to childless couples through agents for a price ranging from Rs 1.80 lakh to Rs 5.50 lakh a baby, police said.
While the police took the babies away from the couples, they also slapped on them case under sections of child trafficking and the Juvenile Justice Act.
“The couples, as well as two women who had ‘bought’ the infants, had bonded with them… But what they have done is illegal,” Inspector Govind Reddy told the publication.
A woman who had 'purchased' a three-month-old baby admitted that her husband had warned her against this as she ensured that she was taking care of the child.
“We do not have a child after years of marriage, and this girl brought so much joy into our lives,’’ IE quoted her as saying.
“I don’t know what to do. In one instant my life is finished, my baby has been snatched from me. I don’t care if it is illegal, I was taking care of him like a mother… like he is my own child. What is the point in taking him away now?”, said another woman.
Several couples stood in front of the vehicles as they pled the police to hand the babies back to them.
Shedding light on the process in which this racket functioned, an investigator clarified that the couples "chose" babies after seeing WhatsApp images of them as they believed that they were giving them a new life. After the couples 'chose' the baby and paid for them in full, the child was brought to them from New Delhi or Pune via train or private transport and handed over in the night.
The police is now enroute to Delhi in a bid to track the agents involved in trafficking and also find the biological parents of the babies. In case the cops are unable to track the parents, the children would be put up for adoption and the couples can legally adopt the babies then.
(With PTI inputs)