Bhopal: Fearing job loss over 2-kid policy, MP couple dump newborn; duo booked

BHOPAL: Fear of losing his job under MP’s two-child policy allegedly drove a govt school teacher and his wife to bury their three-day-old son alive in a forest in Chhindwara district. The baby boy, the couple’s fourth child, miraculously survived after villagers heard his cries from beneath stones, pulled him out and rushed him to hospital.

Bablu Dandolia, 38, and his wife Rajkumari, 28, allegedly abandoned the child in Nandanwadi village of Dhanora area on Sept 26, three days after his birth. The incident came to light with their arrests on Tuesday, the day NCRB data showed MP topped in infant abandonment cases for the fourth straight year.

Initially booked for abandonment, the couple now faces attempt-to-murder charges after a video surfaced showing the infant buried under stones. Police said the couple already has three children — an 11-year-old daughter, a seven-year-old daughter & a four-year-old son.

“They told us they had managed to conceal the third child from records but feared Bablu would lose his job if a fourth was registered,” Dhanora PS in-charge Lakhanlal Ahirwar told TOI . “On Sept 23, Rajkumari gave birth to a boy. Three days later, they carried him on a motorcycle to the forest and abandoned him.”

Under MP’s two-child policy, no govt employee can have more than two children.