New Delhi: Mukesh, a 40-year-old truck driver, and his wife Reema, a 38-year-old homemaker, had been married for eight years and longed for a child. Despite multiple IVF treatments and hospital visits across Gwalior and Delhi-NCR, they remained childless. During a visit to an IVF centre in Delhi in July last year, they met Pratibha, a freelance lab technician at the facility. She offered to help them have a baby.
Pratibha took the couple to Dr Viveki's Hira's Multispeciality Hospital in Begum Pur, Rohini. After examining Reema, doctors declared she could not conceive. Police sources revealed that Pratibha and Viveki then offered to arrange a male infant for Rs 8 lakh. Mukesh and Reema agreed, despite not having the full amount at the time.
The couple returned to Gwalior and informed their family that Reema was pregnant. Mukesh pooled his savings and borrowed from relatives to raise the money. They were also asked to pay Rs 1 lakh for treatments, though the nature of these procedures remains unclear as IVF was no longer needed.
In September last year, the couple returned to Delhi, telling friends and relatives it was for Reema's treatment. Instead, they rented a house in Gurgaon and became part of an interstate child trafficking network. Reema sent photos of her growing baby bump to relatives, which later turned out to be a pillow. Police confirmed that relatives shared these fabricated pregnancy photos during the investigation.
The charade lasted nine months. The couple was promised a baby boy in June this year. As the date approached, the IVF centre offered them a baby girl for an additional Rs 1 lakh, suggesting they could pass the infants off as twins. The girl had been abandoned by her mother at an IVF centre, while the boy was being smuggled from Pali, Madhya Pradesh, to the Rohini hospital.
The babies were handed over to Mukesh and Reema on June 16. To deceive relatives, fake paperwork was created, claiming Reema delivered twins in a car at 2:50 am and 3:05 am on June 17, a day after receiving the babies. Documents also showed she was admitted to Viveki's hospital for three days post-birth. However, investigators found no car owned by the couple, and Viveki initially denied involvement, though hospital records confirmed Reema had been a patient.
Viveki and Pratibha were arrested, along with Mukesh and Reema, who had left for Gwalior with the twins. The children were rescued from Gwalior and found to be in good condition. Another couple, Sunny (37) and Ritu Arora (38) from Panipat, who wanted to adopt a baby, were also arrested. Sunny, a fabric businessman, contacted Pratibha five months ago through an IVF centre in Gurgaon. The gang took them near a court, handed them stamp papers, and claimed the adoption was complete, giving them a male infant for Rs 6 lakh. Ritu pretended to be pregnant and introduced the child as her own until police arrived.
