No girls please, customers told West Bengal infant traffickers
The babies were rescued from the third floor of the home in the Thakurpukur area early Friday.
Kolkata: Ten babies were rescued from an old age home in the southern parts of the city on Friday as the traffickers failed to "sell" them as they were girls, a senior CID officer said on .
He said as the "demand" for a baby girl was not much compared to a baby boy, the traffickers had found no taker for the 10 toddlers, aged approximately between one and 10 months.
The babies were rescued from the third floor of the home in the Thakurpukur area early Friday.
"A newborn boy fetches them Rs 2 lakh, which at times goes up to Rs 4 lakh. But, the demand for a girl child was not that high and selling one could only fetch Rs 1 lakh," the officer said, adding that this was told to them by Reena Banerjee and Basanti Chakraborty, both associated with the home.
The baby girls were also not properly looked after which led to malnutrition and other health complications in them.
The 10 rescued babies were undergoing treatment at ESI Hospital, Joka and the doctors there said their "health condition" was not sound because of the "negligent treatment" they received at the home.
"Most of the babies were suffering from malnutrition and skin diseases while one was thalassemic and two were extremely weak because they were not provided with the basic care a baby requires, especially mother's milk," one doctor said.
The CID has also exhumed the remains of two infants found from the compound of Sujit Memorial Trust at Machlandapur in Habra.
"We have a doubt that these two infants were also girls...Forensic tests are being done to ascertain the cause of their death. Necessary action will be taken on the basis of the report," he said.
Talking about the investigation into the child trafficking racket, the officer said it has surfaced that Tapan Biswas was the mastermind behind the entire operations spread in various districts of West Bengal.