Mysuru: A couple of months ago she was lying in a park with only the sky for shelter, having run from her husband, who was bent on selling her and her unborn child, just as he had done with their other two children.
But life seems to have taken a turn for the better for Fathima, who gave birth to a baby girl at the JSS hospital recently. And her husband, Manjunath, was by her aside, apparently a reformed man after a good telling off by a women's police station inspector, Jayarathna. She has decided to call the baby Sneha and has since been discharged from hospital.
Fathima was all smiles as she lay with her baby by her side on a hospital bed when this correspondent visited her. Both mother and child are in good health.
The 30- year- old woman from Vasanthnagar was seven months pregnant when she was rescued from a park here along with her nine- month old baby girl and lodged at the Shakthidhama destitute rehabilitation centre by the Mysuru city police on a tip- off by the Deccan Chronicle. She had spent two nights in the park, braving the cold and complained that her husband, Manjunath had sold her first two children and was all set to sell their third child and her too.
Moved by her plight, some good Samaritans who lived near the park, alerted Deccan Chronicle and it in turn informed the city police which rescued her immediately. Convinced by the police to take care of his wife, Manjunath regularly visited Fathima in the months that followed and is with her now. Her mother too is by her side.
