Timely rescue: Unwanted for some, most wanted for others

Police arrest couple for sale of abandoned babies.

ISLAMABAD:

It was the fourth time that an abandoned bundle was recovered from same locality in the outskirts of the capital in February. Only this time, the day-old baby inside was alive. The Bhara Kahu police shifted the newborn to an incubator in Polyclinic.

No one came to claim the baby. “The baby found no takers as he was [probably] presumed dead “ said a police investigator. It was only a matter of days before it landed in Edhi homes to find a foster mother’s lap.

The incident served as an impetus for the police to investigate those involved in bringing the baby, and numerous others before it, into the world.

As the events unraveled, police found the missing link to the investigation: Dr Arshad and his wife, Dr Aisha, who were finally caught after a long investigation in an undercover operation. She was sent on a judicial remand on Thursday.

Dr Arshad was arrested red-handed while receiving Rs45,000 from a buyer of an illegitimate newborn baby. The buyer was an undercover cop and the currency notes were marked, said a police official. “Our investigations led us to the doctor and we decided to catch him red-handed with evidence so that he could not escape,” said one of the investigators.

After the recovery of abandoned newborn babies, the Bhara Kahu police held and questioned many midwives in the area, on suspicion they could be involved in carrying out the illegal abortions of girls who wanted to get rid of unwanted babies.

However, the real lead came from a potential buyer of babies for couples. On the information extracted from the suspected buyer, the police planned an undercover operation.

One of the cops in a civil dress contacted Dr Arshad and expressed interest in purchasing a newborn baby. After a brief bargain, the price was fixed at Rs45,000. On Tuesday, the doctor called the potential buyer (the undercover cop) to his office at Niaz Medical Centre, to receive the baby.

The cop gave him the marked currency notes of Rs45,000 and received the day-old baby before a police party raided the clinic and arrested the doctor red-handed with the marked notes. The police discovered that the doctor obtained the baby through an abortion for which he charged the girl Rs10,000 the same day.

“This was not the first time. The doctor and his wife were doing this business for a long time,” said an investigator. He said the two doctors were involved in carrying out abortions of girls, who wanted to get rid of unwanted pregnancies.

The babies born alive were sold while the dead ones were disposed of. In both cases, the real mother would not want to keep the baby and the doctors used it to make money.

A police official said that abortion in every form is illegal, except where a doctor suggests one to save the mother’s life. The arrested doctor, in initial interrogations, admitted of selling babies on five previous occasions but not of carrying out abortions. A court remanded him in police custody on Wednesday, where the investigators would question him to ascertain information about his racket.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 23^rd, 2012.