Two women associated with Missionaries of Charity in Ranchi were arrested on Thursday after being accused of selling babies.
On Friday, Missionaries of Charity, in press release, said, “we’re completely shocked by what has happened in our home in Ranchi. It should never have happened. It is completely against our moral conviction. We are carefully looking into this matter. We will take all the necessary precautions that this kind of incident will never happen again”.
The organisation was founded by Mother Teresa, a Nobel Peace prize winner and a Catholic saint in India in 1950.
Sister Koncilia, a nun at Missionaries of Charity run in Ranchi by the name of Nirmal Hriday, was arrested on Thursday while a staff Anima Indwar was arrested earlier on Wednesday.
Nirmal Hriday is a shelter for unwed mothers.
Investigation ongoing
"Two arrests have been made in the case…investigation is going on as we’ve also got certain leads about other children being sold by them to different couples…we’re verifying the addresses”, Ranchi Senior Superintendent of Police Anis Gupta said.
The arrests of two women were prompted by a complaint filed by state run Child Welfare Committee (CWC) at Kotwali police station in Ranchi.
“An FIR has been lodged under Section 370 of the IPC”, said Kotwali Officer-in-Charge Shyamanand Mandal. Section 370 pertains to trafficking of persons.
The Committee said that a couple from neighboring State Uttar Pradesh had paid ₹1,20,000 for a 14-day old boy born to a young woman at a Missionaries of Charity shelter.
The couple was allegedly told that the money was for hospital expenses.
Anima Indwar, said the complaint filed by CWC, sold the baby to the UP couple on May 14.
“CWC should have been informed by the Missionaries of Charity when the pregnant woman was taken to hospital ...the committee has come to know that other babies too were sold to different people in different cities”, CWC chairperson Rupa Verma told The Hindu over phone.
Operation shutdown in 2015
Earlier, Missionaries spokesperson in Ranchi Sunita Kumar had said there was no question of selling any child as the Missionaries of Charity had stopped giving children for adoption three years ago.
The Missionaries of Charity opted to shut down its adoption services in India in 2015 after objecting to the Indian government’s decision to allow single or divorced parents to adopt children, she said.
The CWC officials said that twelve pregnant women who were living at the Missionaries of Charity shelter home too have been transferred to a government-run shelter Karuna Shelter Home.
“The Committee will also be shifting around 70 children who have been given shelter in Nirmal Shishu Bhawan, another branch of the organization, to other homes”, said CWC member Tanushree Sarkar told The Hindu .
