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Syed Amin Jafri in Hyderabad
Officials of the Women Development and Child Welfare Department rescued 59 infants and children from an adoption home at Tandur town and shifted them to Hyderabad on Saturday night.
While nine ailing infants have been admitted to Niloufer Hospital, the other 50 infants and children have been lodged at Sisu Vihar, a government-run children's home at Vengalrao Nagar.
While 40 children are below the age of one year, 19 are aged between one and five years.
A team of officials led by Women Development and Child Welfare director Shailini Mishra raided the John Abraham Memorial Bethany Home at Tandur following reports that two infants died at the Home on Friday due to lack of proper care and nourishment.
The operation was a follow-up to the findings of a fact-finding group of non-government organisations that visited the home recently and found glaring irregularities in its functioning.
This is the second such raid on adoption homes in two days by the officials of Women Development and Child Welfare Department.
On Friday, they had raided the children's home run by Action for Social Development at Gandhi Nagar in Hyderabad and rescued 34 infants aged below one year and they were shifted to Sisu Vihar.
Thus far, 93 infants and children have been rescued from the two children's homes.
Officials said that Savitramma, who was managing the ASD children's home, has been absconding since the Karnataka police registered a case of cheating against the adoption home for procuring infants from tribal hamlets of Karnataka.
Following reports of the raid in Hyderabad, the staff of Bethany Home abandoned the home and fled, leaving the infants and children to their fate. Two infants died on Friday and Saturday before the Department officials organised the rescue operation.
The Karnataka government has entrusted the probe into the alleged sale of 18 female children at Lambada tandas (hamlets) in Chincholi area of Gulbarga district to the Corps of Detectives.
Gulbarga police have recovered incriminating documents from the Bethany Home at Tandur and arrested two persons on Friday in connection with the racket.
Meanwhile, the Tandur police have also registered a case in connection with the alleged death of female infants, numbering between 18 to 28, at the Bethany Home in the past two to three months and "disposal of their bodies" without informing the administration.
The police have exhumed the body of a baby from the compound of the Bethany Home and decided to seal the compound.
The infants died due malnutrition and illness while waiting to be sold to foreigners and were quietly buried.
Women Development and Child Welfare director Shailini Mishra on Sunday said some organisations are involved in procuring children from five districts -- Mahbubnagar, Nalgonda, Rangareddy, Medak and Hyderabad.
ALSO SEE: AP govt orders probe into child adoption racket
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