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UP minister accused of stealing baby

A UP minister is faced with an allegation of having stolen a child from a hospital on a complaint from the woman who claims to be the mother

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Rajesh Tripathi insists he adopted the child

LUCKNOW: A UP minister is faced with a rather embarrassing allegation of having stolen a child from a hospital. On a complaint from the woman who claims to be the mother of the child, a local court has ruled that a DNA test be done to verify her claim.

“I am ready for any test… even a DNA test,” Rajesh Tripathi, minister of state for homeopathy, told reporters in Gorakhpur on Monday. Tripathi said that the boy, named Manas, had not been stolen. “I adopted him after he had been found abandoned and brought to me,” he said.

Tripathi, a former journalist and social worker, is a first-time MLA of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) from Chillupar, a constituency in Gorakhpur. On the other hand, Pramila Vishwakarma, hailing from Rudrapur in the neighbouring Deoria district, has stuck to her claim that the infant being reared in the minister’s bungalow in Lucknow was actually her son. 

“The police have been impotent in this case for the past three years as Rajesh Tripathi is an influential politician… I have no hope of getting my child back as Tripathi has become a minister now,” said Pramila.

The story goes back to 2004 when Pramila gave birth to a baby boy at the BRD Medical College, Gorakhpur, on January 13. According to her account, two women claiming to be from her village came to look her up on January 15. “They took the boy in their lap, and kept praising his looks and health… then they suddenly walked away and vanished before we could understand anything,” says Pramila’s father Brijnath.

Brijnath and Pramila’s husband Ashok Vishwakarma lodged an FIR about the baby being stolen by two unidentified women at the nearby Gularia police station. Some days later, they were told that their child had been adopted by Rajesh Tripathi, then a journalist in a local Hindi newspaper.

They lurked around Tripathi’s house for some days and after confirming that the child was indeed theirs, they informed the police of the same. But, since the police did not do much in the matter for a long time, Pramila approached the court.

The Gorakhpur district and sessions judge has ruled that a DNA test be conducted to confirm if Manas is really Pramila’s son.
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