Child trafficking racket busted in Ghaziabad, marriage bureau owners among 4 held

According to police, the gang targeted fair-skinned newborns that fetched them up to Rs 5 lakh and is suspected to have trafficked more than 10 babies over the past three years.

The accused — Afsar Ali, a resident of Ghaziabad, his friend Naved Ansari, a labourer, Swati, 35, a resident of Shamli, and Sandhya, 37, of Muzaffarnagar — were arrested based on a child missing complaint lodged at the Tronica Police Station on August 4, the police said on Friday. The child’s father, Rashid, a resident of Pooja Colony, told the police that some unidentified men kidnapped the infant while he was lying on the ground and playing outside his house.

“Based on manual intelligence and CCTV footage, we tracked the suspects to a lane near Loni Inter College. When we intercepted, the two men abandoned the infant in the lane and fled on a motorcycle,” said Siddharth Gautam, Assistant Commissioner of Police, Tronica City.

The women were arrested later, he added.

“These two women own marriage bureaus in Muzaffarnagar and Shamli and also ran a child trafficking racket that involved abducting babies and selling them to childless couples across various states,” said the officer.

Investigation revealed that the pictures of the abducted baby began circulating through a network from Delhi to Moradabad, and subsequently, a couple from Moradabad had initially shown interest in buying the boy for Rs 2.5 lakh. “But when they backed out, the gang contacted another couple in Amroha, who agreed to pay Rs 1.5 lakh,” said ACP Gautam.

Gautam said that the gang had a large network spreading to Delhi, Bijnor, Moradabad, Roorkee, Amroha, and possibly Jammu & Kashmir and Nepal.

The modus operandi

The police said that the accused would randomly click photos of children playing and circulate them on social media, particularly on WhatsApp groups. “Swati and Sandhya, who had contacts of couples because of the marriage bureaus, would reach out to childless couples,’’ read the police statement.

The police said that they would then bargain the rates depending on the gender and complexion of the child. “Nurse Ranjhana aka Reeta of Moradabad, and Asha worker Deepak Singh would also provide information on children from their health facilities, particularly those born to women with unwanted pregnancies and from poor backgrounds,” the statement said.

The police have also reportedly recovered incriminating chats from the mobile phones of the two women, including discussions with Reeta and Deepak about selling the children and their possible rates.

“We have found that Reeta was active in the gang for over two years and would transfer babies to the other gang members after misleading women patients that they had delivered a stillborn,” said an officer.

A First Information Report has been registered against the arrested individuals under Section 143 (4) (trafficking) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita at Tronica City police station.”We plan to add more charges as the investigation progresses and arrest those absconding,” the officer said.