New Delhi: Three people have been arrested by the Delhi Police in the case relating to two-year-old battered baby Falak, police said Wednesday. However, it was not clear if any of them were responsible for grievously injuring the baby.
“Sandeep, his wife Pooja and Jitendra Kumar Gupta, the father of the teenage girl Mahi who brought Falak to the hospital have been arrested,” Additional Commissioner of Police (southeast) Ajay Chaudhary told reporters here. Pooja is a sex worker and Sandeep her husband.
Asked about the culprit who inflicted the injuries on the baby, police refused to comment citing that many more people were involved in the case and answering the question might hurt investigations.
According to police, Mahi used to be assaulted at home by Jitendra and she finally ran away in June 2011 and was missing since.
She then came in touch with Pooja who was a sex worker from Kolkata’s red light area Sonagachi and would often visit her father Jitendra at their home.
Pooja then took Mahi to Etah (Uttar Pradesh) and forced her to marry an aged man. Upon refusing, Mahi was repeatedly raped by Pooja’s husband Sandeep.
They later brought her to Delhi and forced her into sex trade in Munirka area of south Delhi. It was here that she met the key accused in the case Raj Kumar Gupta, who married her.
Falak was brought to the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) Jan 18 with severe head injuries and bite marks all over her face by Mahi who got the baby from her husband Raj Kumar before heading to Mumbai.
He got the baby from Laxmi who after being questioned by police revealed that she in fact got the baby from Munni, the biological mother of Falak who claimed that she and the baby had been abandoned by her husband last year.
Meanwhile, battling for survival at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), two-year-old baby Falak continued to be critical Wednesday, with doctors diagnosing blood infection apart from the existing infection in her chest and brain. “Her condition is same as in the morning, except that she has developed blood infection apart from the already existing brain and chest infection. She is still critical,” Deepak Agrawal, associate professor of neurosurgery at the AIIMS Trauma Centre, told reporters.
“We will give same antibiotics for blood infection also,” he said.
Doctors say it’s a race against time to save the toddler.
“Brain infection is a very devastating thing, her chances of survival are now less than 50 percent. We are waiting for the culture reports to decide if there will be any change in the course of treatment,” Agrawal added.
According to the team of doctors monitoring her condition, in spite of many infections, the baby’s vital organs are functioning properly. (IANS)