Woman Kidnaps Nephew To Convince Lover The Child Is Theirs, Arrested

A 38-year-old married woman allegedly abducted her three-month-old nephew in Maharashtra's Palghar district to pose to her paramour that the baby was theirs in a bid to start a new life with him, police said on Tuesday.

The woman had taken the baby to Nalanda in Bihar from where police rescued the infant and arrested the woman on Sunday, they said.

The woman allegedly abducted the son of her sister-in-law from Mandvi in Vasai area of Palghar on February 18 afternoon under the pretext of taking him for an outing and fled, Mandvi police station's inspector Sanjay Hazare said.

After being unable to locate them, the child's family lodged a police complaint, based on which an FIR was registered under section 137(2) (kidnapping) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), he said.

The Mandvi police launched an extensive investigation, using technical surveillance and intelligence inputs, to track the woman. They later came to know she was in Nalanda, Bihar, the official said.

The police from here subsequently went to Nalanda where they sought the assistance from the police's Divisional Intelligence Unit (DIU).

The Mandvi police, in coordination with the Nalanda DIU and local police, raided some houses in a locality at Suryachak village, Mirnagar, near Bihar-Jharkhand border and found the woman with the child in a house, the official said.

The child was rescued and reunited with his family, and the woman was brought back to Mandvi on Sunday, he said.

During interrogation, the woman told the police that she was married and had three children, but wanted to start a new life with her paramour in Bihar, the official said.

The woman had not informed her paramour that she was already married and had children, the police said.

She created an impression of being single and newly pregnant, following which she abducted her sister-in-law's son and pretended to her paramour that the child was theirs, the official said.

She also showed the baby to her paramour over video call to convince him of her story, he said.

The woman's plan was to settle down with her paramour, using the child as proof of their supposed new beginning, the official said.

Further investigation into the case was on, the police said. 

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