The Hindu : Karnataka News : ‘Most of the cases received at CDFD relate to paternity disputes’

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Nov 02, 2007
ePaper

Karnataka

Karnataka

‘Most of the cases received at CDFD relate to paternity disputes’

Staff Reporter

Bangalore: Lalji Singh, Director, Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology, Hyderabad, speaking of his experience at the Centre for DNA Fingerprinting and Diagnostics (CDFD) that he founded 10 years ago, said that of the cases the CDFD received a majority were related to paternity disputes.

“We received approximately 100 cases every year, out of which 70 cases were private cases which involved husbands who suspected their wives of infidelity.

Men often brought in their families, in order to verify that their children were indeed theirs and not that of another man,” Dr. Singh said. “In as many as 95 per cent of the cases, DNA fingerprinting proved their suspicion wrong,” he added. Most of the families who came in for testing were from fairly well to do background – overwhelmingly, businessmen from Kerala and Mumbai. Each test costs Rs. 7,500, he said. “So suspicious were some of the husbands that they brought in locks of hair of their child without the knowledge of the mother, even though it is mandatory that both husband and wife approve of the testing,” Dr. Singh said.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Karnataka