Mumbai baby selling racket: Accused women sent a pregnant teenager to Indonesia

Prime accused Julia Fernandes got her accomplice Huma Dalvi arrested on Sunday after she revealed her name to the police while saying that they sold six babies together.

A 29-year-old woman and her accomplice, who were arrested in a baby selling racket, told the police that they had sent a 19-year-old pregnant girl to Indonesia to a couple, who later may have adopted her child.

Prime accused Julia Fernandes got her accomplice Huma Dalvi arrested on Sunday after she revealed her name to the police while saying that they sold six babies together.

Dalvi told the police that she got a passport made for a 19-year-old girl a few months ago and sent her to Indonesia to work for a couple. “Dalvi said she was sent as a domestic help but the girl was probably two months pregnant. The couple, who had allegedly bought the girl’s child, took care of her and after her delivery adopted the baby legally,” said an officer from Wadala TT police station. The police are now probing if there are any other cases with international links.

Dalvi has also told the police that she had sold eight babies. Fernandes and Dalvi were in touch with several IVF clinics and illegal abortion centres in Navi Mumbai, Nalasopara and Panvel to look for couples who wanted to abort. Dalvi would convince them to keep the child and sell it to them for Rs 20,000 to Rs 50,000. The duo and their agents used to find women for surrogacy too and supply them to illegal IVF centres.

According to the police officers, Dalvi was in this business just for a lavish lifestyle. Apart from selling babies to a doctor in Worli, another doctor in Bengaluru and a couple in Thane, Dalvi has also now confessed to have sold a newborn to a hotel chain owner who stays in Charkop in Kandivli. “The hotel owner was in America all this while. He has come to India and we have called him for questioning,” the officer added.

In another revelation, Dalvi said she had sold a baby to a Bengaluru doctor for Rs12 lakh saying that it was the surrogate’s fees. But the baby the doctor was given was an unwanted child and could have been stolen. “We are now looking into the baby theft case,” said the officer. Fernandes, who is in judicial custody, told the police that she had sold a few babies to Rakhi, an accused in the Thane baby selling racket.

These women have confessed to have sold six to eight babies but the police call it a tip of the ice berg. The cops think the number could be much bigger since they sold atleast two babies a month.