Accused pretended to be pregnant despite miscarriage

Chinmoyee Bej, the accused woman, had posed as if she was pregnant even after miscarrying three months ago with a plan to steal the baby from Calcutta Medical College and Hospital.

The police arrested Chinmoyee and her husband Prasanta from their residence at Bagmari after being informed by the local Councillor. The child who was stolen from Calcutta Medical College and Hospital (CMCH) was also recovered from their possession.

Both Chinmoyee and her husband were remanded to police custody till March 24 after being produced before the additional chief metropolitan magistrate on Wednesday. The couple was booked under different sections of the Indian Penal Code on charges of child trafficking (Section 370 of the IPC) and criminal conspiracy (120B).

Police came to know after investigation that Chinmoyee had a miscarriage three months ago. But her family members were expecting a boy in their family as the couple having a girl. The woman was rebuked and ridiculed by her husband after the miscarriage as he was expecting a boy child this time. Thus, the woman had started planning to steal a baby and didn't let any other member of her family apart from her husband know that she had a miscarriage. Her husband too hid the matter from the members of the family. Chinmoyee's aunt works as an ayah in CMCH and she was well aware about the situation Chinmoyee was passing through after her miscarriage. She had given a tip-off to Chinmoyee that a pregnant woman from the same Bagmari area, Saraswati Naskar, was admitted to the hospital.

Chinmoyee had chalked out the entire plan of stealing Saraswati's baby since the day she had got the tip-off from her aunt.

She used to keep a watch on Saraswati. She used to go to the hospital since the day Saraswati was admitted and picked up Saraswati's baby when there was no one around in the ward on Tuesday afternoon.

Chinmoyee had left her home pretending as if she was at the last stage of pregnancy. She returned with the baby and told her in-laws that she gave birth to the boy child before reaching the hospital in a taxi. She narrated the same story to the local people.

The situation turned worse for the couple when they took the baby to Dr Gour Dey in the locality. Dr Dey refused to accept that the child was born on Tuesday. It led to a suspicion and local people also came to know about it.

Subsequently, it led to a hue and cry in the area. The local people understood that the baby with the couple was the same stolen from CMCH. They approached the local Councillor, who then informed the police. The Kolkata Police had announced a prize money of Rs 1 lakh on Tuesday for the person who will help to find out the stolen child. When asked, Rajeev Kumar, Commissioner of Kolkata Police said: "The investigation is yet to be over. We are probing to find whether there was any foulplay and then the matter of giving the prize money will be decided."

Names of some local women like Rekha, Soma, Tina and Tumpa has come up who had first identified that the couple had brought the baby in their house.