Child trafficking case: CID team at BJP MP Roopa Ganguly’s house to quiz her

The Criminal Investigation Department had unearthed a child trafficking racket earlier this year under which babies and children were allegedly sold, some to foreigners, through illegal adoption deals.

The West Bengal CID on Saturday went to the residence of BJP’s Rajya Sabha MP Roopa Ganguly for questioning her in connection with a child trafficking case in Jalpaiguri, a senior official said.

BJP’s Rajya Sabha MP Roopa Ganguly.(Vipin Kumar/HT File Photo)

A team of the agency’s officers went to Ganguly’s south Kolkata house to question her over her alleged meeting with former BJP women wing general secretary Juhi Chowdhury, an accused in the case who was under arrest, a senior CID official said.

The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) had unearthed a child trafficking racket earlier this year under which babies and children were allegedly sold, some to foreigners, through illegal adoption deals.

“We will question her about her links to Chowdhury and also we need answers to a few more questions,” the officer said.

The state CID had also summoned BJP national general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya and two other leaders for questioning in the same case.

The probe agency had arrested several people, including the head of a child protection agency in Darjeeling and a member of a child welfare committee, on charges of child trafficking.

Those arrests were part of a widening probe into the adoption racket at the Bimala Shishu Griho, a children’s home in Jalpaiguri town.

Chowdhury and the chief adoption officer of the children’s home, Sonali Mondal, the home’s chairperson Chandana Chakraborty and her brother Manas Bhowmik were arrested earlier.

They have been charged with selling about 17 children, aged between one and 14 years, to foreigners while falsely claiming that the children were handed over for legal adoption to needy couples after due screening and official procedures.

The CID had unearthed the child trafficking racket during raids at homes and nursing homes in the Baduria area of North 24 Parganas district, in Behala in the southern fringes of Kolkata and some other parts of south Bengal in November last year.