Investigators suspect that a gang involved in kidnap of infants for sale to persons or couples seeking a male child could be behind the abduction of a three-day-old child from Bowring and Lady Curzon Hospital on Sunday.
A woman, in her early 30s and clad in a burqa, walked away with the baby boy at around 12.45 p.m. from the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) of the hospital in Shivajinagar after taking the infant from its mother Farida Mujib (25) on the pretext of playing with him.
Sources in the Commercial Street Police Station said that the woman could be part of a gang that steals baby boys and sells them.
Earlier, CCTV camera footage from Bowring hospital showed the woman suspect walking away after hiding the child under her burqa. “Examination of the earlier footage from the hospital and a bus-stop nearby shows the woman walking in along with a man who appears to be in his early 40s. He is seen with her till she reaches the NICU and approaches the mother who was feeding the child,” an officer said. Later, the footage shows the woman walked out of the hospital premises but her male accomplice is not seen.
Magnified images of the man and the woman have been circulated to various police stations in the city and the State in a bid to locate the duo and rescue the kidnapped child. Investigators are also combing through previous cases of child kidnap and questioning known offenders. However, till Tuesday evening, the identities of the duo hadn’t been established, police sources added.
Minister of State for Medical Education Sharan Prakash Patil and Minister for Information and Infrastructure Development R. Roshan Baig visited the hospital and met the family of the kidnapped infant. They promised the parents that their child would be rescued soon.
