No clues to baby theft

Statesman News Service

MALDA, June 4: Police have not yet been able to trace the female newborn, stolen from a government hospital at Bulbulchandi in Malda’s Habibpur police station area last Friday.The Malda SP, Mr DK Mondal, said Mrs Sanju Barman, who gave birth to the baby on 2 June, allowed an unknown woman to take care of her. “An unknown woman came to the hospital at dusk on Friday. She wanted to hold the newborn on her lap and was allowed to do so by Mrs Barman. Later, when Mrs Barman fell asleep, the woman escaped with the baby,” the SP said. Soon after the incident, hospital authorities lodged an FIR with police. Although police are leaving no stone unturned to nab the culprit, they have not yet been able to trace either the baby or the woman who committed the crime. Police, however, are not blaming the hospital authorities for the incident. “There was no negligence on the hospital staff’s part. No one expected the woman to leave with the baby. The incident was the first of its kind in the hospital and it has surprised us all,” the SP said. He said all police stations in the district have been alerted. Although police have given a clean chit to the hospital authorities, they could not answer why the security system was not tight in the maternity ward.Given that a similar incident had occurred at the Siliguri Sub-divisional Hospital in 2004, security ought to have been tightened in all the hospitals for safety of newborns. But the Malda administration has faltered on this count. After the Siliguri hospital incident, even the state government had ordered the authorities concerned of all districts to tighten security around government hospitals, but to no avail. The mystery surrounding the disappearance of the newborn of Mrs Champa Sarkar from Siliguri Subdivisional Hospital in 2004, is yet to be solved.