The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : Missing boy found living with `foster parents'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Jul 08, 2006

Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

Missing boy found living with `foster parents'

Staff Reporter

Directive to bring him to the court on Monday

BANGALORE: In a strange case, a nine-year-old boy, who had been missing from a doctor's clinic at Malleswaram here for eight years, was found living with his "foster parents" at Mahalakshmi Layout.

When the distraught parents sought custody of their child, the "foster parents" said that they had raised the boy for nine years and would part with him only if the court ordered them to do so.

The parents approached the Karnataka High Court with a habeas corpus petition seeking a direction to the city police to produce their son, Pramod.

According to the boy's mother, G.R. Sundari, she gave birth to a baby boy in a private nursing home at Vyalikaval. Since she developed complications in the stomach after pregnancy, she began visiting a clinic at Malleswaram for treatment.

On December 4, 1997, Ms. Sundari went to the clinic along with her child, who was then seven months old. When Sundari went inside the examination room in the clinic, the doctor reportedly asked her to leave the child in the outer room where a woman was sitting.

According to Ms. Sundari, she left the child in the custody of the woman and went inside for medical examination. When she came out, she found her son missing. She raised a hue and cry and later complained to the police. However, the boy remained untraced till 2005.

On May 20, 2005, Ms. Sundari approached the then Commissioner of Police Ajai Kumar Singh with a request to trace her child. The Commissioner called her back, saying that the whereabouts of the child had been traced and that she could get in touch with the Malleswaram police.

The Malleswaram police then summoned the doctor who had treated Ms. Sundari. The doctor revealed the whereabouts of the child.

Ms. Sundari said she went to Mahalakshmi Layout where she found her child being brought up by a couple. Her child was studying in the fourth standard. The couple allegedly told Ms. Sundari that Pramod was given to them for adoption by the doctor. A Division Bench comprising Justice R. Gururajan and Justice Jawad Rahim, recorded the statement of the doctor that the boy was "collected" from her clinic by a landlord in whose house Ms. Sundari and her husband were staying in 1997. She said the boy was handed over to the "foster parents" who came to her clinic three months later and thanked her. The Bench directed the "foster parents" to bring the child to the court on Monday and adjourned further hearing on the matter.

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