An alert citizen and the police traced and recovered a newborn baby boy, who was kidnapped from the Primary Health Centre (PHC) at Madanahipparga village in Aland taluk of Kalaburagi district. He was found after three hours.
The four-day-old infant was kidnapped by 24-year old Arati Shinde, a resident of Pune, in the morning. She was picked up by the Solapur police after being alerted by the Kalaburagi police. Superintendent of Police Amit Singh said that the accused Arati, who had come to Madanahipparga village on Monday evening, admitted herself in the PHC feigning illness. She befriended Gouramma Shanmukappa who had given birth to a baby four days ago.
Mr. Singh said on Tuesday around 5.30 a.m., Arati took the baby with the consent of the mother saying that injections had to be given and quickly exited the PHC and boarded a bus to Solapur around 6 a.m. However, Dharmaraya, a resident of the Madanhipparga village, who was also going to Solapur in the same bus grew suspicious of the womanand made inquiries through his phone as to whether a baby was missing.
On being informed that a baby boy was missing and a woman from Maharashtra had kidnapped the child, Dharmaraya kept a close watch on Arati. He informed Aland police about the woman. Deputy Superintendent of Police S.L. Jhandikar asked his counterpart in Solapur to detain her.
Mr. Singh said that soon after the bus reached the Solapur Bus Stand, the police nabbed the woman and recovered the baby. “Arati is being brought back to Aland for questioning,” he said.
