Not ‘newborn skeletons’, medical waste found at empty plot: Kolkata doctors

Kolkata police suspect that the bodies found at the vacant plot could be part of an abortion racket.

The packets found from a south Kolkata locality contained medical waste and not ‘decomposed remains of 14 babies and foetuses’ as alleged, doctors who examined them have said.

The remains of the babies were found in Haridebpur area in Kolkata’s southern outskirts when workers were cleaning a plot of land a real estate company had recently purchased.(ANI Photo)

Panic prevailed in the city after it was alleged that workers cleaning a plot of land found remains of 14 bodies of newborns.

Kolkata mayor Sovan Chatterjee, who visited the spot, had said that the 14 bodies, wrapped separately in plastic, were in two bags.

Suspecting illegal abortion ring, Kolkata police commissioner Rajeev Kumar rushed to the spot.

However, the police did not open the packets and sent them straight to M R Bangur hospital for post-mortem.

In the evening, doctors informed the police that the packets contained no human tissue.

“Doctors who opened the packets found no human tissue. They found dry ice. Examination is on to determine the exact nature of the material,” said Nilanjan Biswas, deputy commissioner of Kolkata police’s South-West Division.

“A thorough search of the entire area, including nearby water-bodies, will be conducted to see if there are more bodies,” Sovan Chatterjee said.

Barely a couple of hours ago, Biswas had said that the police suspected the packets to be containing remains of foetuses and newborns, but will wait for the post-mortem report to set the course of investigation.

“There is no question of conducting post-mortem because ho human element was found,” said a doctor at M R Bangur hospital on condition of anonymity.

Biswas said a team of forensic science experts have been called in to investigate the packets.

A police officer who did not want to be identified said that the news of recovery of these packets created panic because in November 2016, the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of Bengal Police discovered two skeletons and three skulls of newborns from the premises of an NGO of Maslandapur in North 24 Parganas district.

The CID also busted a baby trafficking racket that was active since 2014 and 50 babies were trafficked, Rajesh Kumar, additional director general, CID had said then.