Four infants undergo DNA testing to trace mothers

They were among 16 trafficked children found in Mysuru

The rescued children were brought to Bapuji Children’s Home in Mysuru, before being shifted to children’s homes in Mandya.

As part of the efforts to identify the biological mothers of children allegedly sold to childless couples in a major trafficking racket unearthed last year, blood samples were drawn from four infants and sent for DNA testing.

The four infants were among the 16 trafficked children, who had been separated from their foster caregivers and admitted to children’s homes in Mandya. After the police managed to trace four women reckoned to be the biological mothers, the infants were taken to a court in Nanjangud near here on Friday, and their blood samples drawn in the presence of a magistrate.

The blood samples were dispatched to the Forensic Sciences Laboratory in Bengaluru on Saturday. “The results are awaited. Our request for testing has been queued,” a police official investigating the case told

The Hindu . It may take three to four weeks for the DNA tests results to be revealed, the official added.

Meanwhile, Mysuru District Child Welfare Committee chairperson Sheela Khare said she will convene a meeting of the committee on Wednesday to take stock of the situation. The committee has so far ruled out the possibility of handing over the children to the caregivers on “humanitarian grounds”. She has maintained that handing over the trafficked children to their “illegal caregivers” amounts to violation of the provisions of the Juvenile Justice Act.

The committee had written to the police to trace the biological parents and the reasons for parents abandoning the children, before declaring them free for adoption under provisions of the Act. One of the women, who has staked claim over her child, is Parvathi, an alms-seeker in Nanjangud. She had lodged a complaint with the police in April last year after her five-month-old son was abducted from the pavement. The Mysuru district police stumbled upon the child trafficking racket only after they began investigation into Ms. Parvathi’s complaint.

Ms. Parvathi’s son had been sold by the abductors to childless couples. The police rescued her son and in the process, uncovered a racket involving two maternity homes in Mysuru. The racketeers had convinced unwed mothers approaching hospitals for abortion to change their mind and instead deliver the babies, that would be sold to childless couples.

The other three women traced by the police are unwed mothers from different parts of Mysuru district.