Four women, including a gynaecologist and a nurse of a Mohali-based hospital, were arrested on Friday for their alleged involvement in the abduction and sale of a 20-day-old baby boy for Rs 30,000. The infant was recovered from a business family in Ludhiana and seemed to be in good health.

Addressing a press conference, Senior Superintendent of Police S S Srivastava said Rashmi, a resident of Ropar, tricked the infant’s mother Mamta, a resident of Colony 5, into handing over the child to her on Thursday. Rashmi presented herself as an employee of the PGI and told Mamta a fictitious government grant worth Rs 5,000 for children. After taking consent from her husband Balram Kumar, a carpenter, Mamta accompanied Rashmi to the PGI in an autorickshaw.

“Once there, the woman asked me to wait outside for about half an hour as she got my son medically examined. But when she did not return, we approached the police,” Mamta told mediapersons.

Fearing the involvement of tantriks, the police constituted special teams to locate the child as soon as possible. At Aditya Raj Hospital in Phase-I, Mohali, where Mamta had delivered the child, the police received a tip-off about a doctor who had reportedly sold the child to a family in Ludhiana for Rs 30,000.

The SSP said they were investigating whether the hospital was running a racket involved in selling babies to issueless couples . “We have not interrogated the women yet. Investigations are on and the true picture is expected to emerge in a day or two,” he added.

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