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The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), on Tuesday, 30 August, said that it has expelled an arrested Firozabad Municipal Corporation leader for allegedly buying a seven-month-old boy from child traffickers.
The Mathura Railway Police has arrested eight people, including BJP corporator Vineeta Agarwal, for allegedly kidnapping a seven-month-old baby and then selling it for Rs 1.8 lakh, eventually busting a human trafficking racket, the police said.
The BJP's Firozabad Mahanagar (city) unit chief Rakesh Shankhwar on Tuesday said the corporator was expelled from the party with immediate effect.
A letter sent to the corporator said that the decision to expel her was taken after the Firozabad Mahanagar complained to the party's state unit regarding her "behaviour."
On 24 August, a seven-month-old baby was kidnapped from the Mathura railway station while he was sleeping with his parents on the platform, the police said.
The accused, who kidnapped the baby, has been identified as Deep Kumar, the police added.
The police recovered the baby from BJP corporator Vineeta Agarwal's house and handed it over to his parents on Monday, 29 August. Agarwal and her husband had allegedly bought the baby, for Rs 1.8 lakh, from two doctors who are said to be a part of the racket.
The arrested eight people include two Auxiliary Nurse Midwives (ANM), two doctors, a corporator of the Firozabad Municipal Corporation, and her husband, the police added.
"With the help of CCTV footage and informants, we found that a man named Deep Kumar from Hathras took the child. He is part of a gang that includes two doctors who run a hospital in the neighboring Hathras district," Mohammed Mushtaq, Superintendent of Police (Railways) said.
He further said that some other health workers were involved too.
"We interrogated the couple in whose home the child was found, and they told us they had only one daughter, and that they wanted a son. That's why they made the deal," Mushtaq added.
While addressing reporters, the police also said that one of the doctors confessed that they run an organised racket where they kidnap young children and sell it to people who want a baby.
The officials identified the accused as Prem Bihari and Dayavati, who run a private hospital in Hathras, Poonam and Vimlesh, the ANMs, and Deep Kumar, who stole the child, besides one Manjeet.
(With inputs from PTI.)
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