A nun and an employee from the Mother Teresa's Charity Home in Ranchi, Jharkhand have been arrested for child trafficking. Child-welfare authorities have accused them of selling a baby. It is suspected that the duo is involved in the selling of three more infants.
Police arrested Sister Konsalia Balsa and charity worker Anima Indwar on Wednesday from Ranchi. The city-based child-welfare committee filed a complaint accusing them of taking Rs 120,000 for selling those babies said police officer Aman Kumar.
“We are completely shocked by what has happened in our home in Ranchi,” a statement from the Missionaries of Charity read.
“We are completely shocked by what has happened in our home in Ranchi,” a statement from the Missionaries of Charity read. “It should have never happened. It is against our moral convictions. We are carefully looking into the matter.”
The missing babies sold by Balsa and Indwar are being searched, the Police said. We will take all necessary precautions that it never happens again, if it has happened," Sunita Kumar of the Missionaries of Charity told the BBC.
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The Missionary's spokeswoman Sunita Kumar said, “There was no question of selling any child as the Missionaries of Charity had stopped giving children for adoption three years ago.” It was also highlighted that the charity had never taken money while arranging adoptions in the past.
“We don’t know how big this is yet,” said Kotwali police inspector Shyamanand Mandal, when asked whether the charity’s other shelters had been involved in similar activities. “We are investigating.”
According to the police, both Balsa and Indwar admitted to selling the babies of women who came to the shelter.
“What these people did — for around 100,000 to 120,000 rupees, they sold the baby to a couple when the baby was less than a month old, sometimes straight from the hospital,” Mandal said.
The Missionaries of Charity was founded by Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu, later known as Mother Teresa, in 1950. And for her exemplary work Mother Teresa was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979.
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