Chennai: The city police Friday arrested a 37-year-old man, for allegedly negotiating sale of his nine-month-old daughter. He had earlier sold his three other children for Rs 50,000 each. Based on information provided by alert relatives, Premraj was picked up while he was negotiating a price for the fourth child. He confessed to the crime and was remanded in judicial custody by the Egmore police. The child and his wife Manju were sent to a home.
Enquiries reveal that Premraj, a resident of Villivakkam, sold his first male child within 10 days of Manju giving birth to him, in 2009 for Rs 50,000. But he claims to have sold him for only Rs 15,000, to Palani from Vellore. The second child, also male, was sold in 2011, and for the same price of Rs 50,000, to a family in Villivakkam. This baby, however, was sold through due procedures by a high court advocate to a childless family. The first two children were born in the same hospital. The next in row was a girl, born at Kilpauk Medical College Hospital, sold in 2012, for the same price to a family in Ayanavaram.
Based on a tip-off then district child protection officer conducted enquiries with Manju who admitted that her husband disposed of all three of her children. Premraj had gone underground since then, while his wife was admitted to a government home. She got pregnant again in 2013 and gave birth to the fourth child at KMC. Premraj, who was in a live-in relationship with another woman, now contacted his wife’s sister Deepa and her husband Dharmaraj to see his fourth child. Sensing his plan, Dharmaraj alerted the Egmore police who swung into action.
Premraj married Manju of Villivakkam in 2007, after he got divorced from his first wife, who gave birth to a girl child. Though the district child protection officer had named Manju in the complaint, the police found that she was innocent and was coerced by her husband every time she wanted to keep the baby, saying that she will not be able to bring up the baby well when she herself was living on the footpath. The police believe that Premraj, a compulsive alcoholic, could have sold the babies for more than the price he had quoted to them. He could have approached the families that had lost their children during birth at maternity hospital for a quick and secret deal. Further investigations are on to trace the whereabouts of the other children.
