Couple Sells Newborn To Pay For Medicine

A couple in India has been arrested for selling their seven days old son to get money to pay for medical treatment for their older son.

European Phoenix -- Sandhya Devi and her husband, together with three other individuals were arrested on Thursday. Sandhya had received a 40,000 rupies ($US675) offer when she was pregnant with her youngest son. She would receive the money once the couple adopted her newborn son.

Sandhya and her husband Ashok Kumar are extremely poor and selling their newborn baby was the only way they could the money the need to buy medicine for their sick two year old son says Ashok. “We were forced to sell our son to get the money. In the end I only got half the amount we agreed on,” Ashok tells police. Police say they arrested 11 individuals involved with the illegal sale of the newborn: the child’s parents, the couple who wanted to adopt the newborn, an individual who brokered the deal and several local officials who put together the paperwork to make the transaction appear as being legal.

Both Sandhya and Ashok were allowed to go home and placed on probation. They were given their son back on the promise they would not attempt to sell him again. A local police officer paid for the medicine their two year old son needed.