Zeenews Bureau
New Delhi: In a breakthrough in the baby Falak case, key accused Rajkumar Gupta was arrested by the Delhi Police from here on Saturday morning. A woman named Pratima was also arrested from Patna in connection with the case.
"Rajkumar, who is the main suspect in the case, and Pratima were arrested Saturday," said Deputy Commissioner of Police Chayya Sharma.
The key accused Rajkumar Gupta, who was absconding, was arrested by Delhi Police from New Delhi Railway Station late Friday night. A woman named Pratima was also arrested, from Patna, in connection with the case. She was part of the human trafficking racket that exploited Rajkumar's 14-year-old girlfriend, Sharma said.
The twin arrests have taken to 10 the number of people arrested so far as part of the probe into baby Falak case that delves into the human trafficking and the prostitution angle.
Meanwhile, two-year-old Falak admitted at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) who was taken off the ventilator was put back to ventilator Saturday morning after she posed breathing problems.
"Next 48 hours are crucial to decide the course of treatment for the baby," Deepak Agrawal, assistant professor of neurosurgery at the apex trauma centre, AIIMS, said on Friday.
The team of doctors monitoring the toddler's condition say the chest and blood infection have subsided, but the brain infection is still a cause for concern.
Falak was admitted to AIIMS on January 18 with a fractured skull, bruises and human bite marks all over her body. A teenager, claiming to be her mother, got her admitted to the hospital.
Arrests in Falak case
A driver and tailor arrested earlier in the case were involved in a prostitution racket for a long time and their network was spread across several cities.
Driver Rana Kumar Gupta, 26, a resident of Badarpur in South Delhi, and Rahul, 24, a tailor from a village in Mohammadpur area in South Delhi, are in judicial custody since last Thursday.
The two, along with Gupta's second wife Arti, pushed a 14-year-old girl, who brought two-year-old baby girl Falak to a hospital here, into prostitution.
A human trafficking and prostitution angle was being suspected in Falak's case as more sordid details emerged with these arrests.
One of those arrested was a woman who allegedly forced the child's biological mother to re-marry and was responsible for the disappearance of Falak's siblings.
The biological mother of Falak has been identified as Munni Khatoon, 22. Police traced her and brought her to Delhi on Sunday from Jhunjhunu district in Rajasthan.
Munni told police that she was married off to another man but was not allowed to keep her three children.
Following her disclosure, police arrested Laxmi, who had taken Rs 2.7 lakh from Munni's second husband for the marriage. Laxmi appears to have played a central role in the suspected sale of Munni's two other children - a boy and a girl, police said.
Munni has three children -- a five-year-old boy, a three-and-a-half year old daughter and Falak -- from her first husband. She got married in 2006 when she was merely 16 years old, police said.
Police also arrested Kanta Choudhary, who is believed to have convinced Munni to leave her first husband, Mohammed Shah Hussain, a criminal, to marry again. Munni is originally from Muzzafarpur in Bihar.
Jitender Gupta, Sandeep, Puja and Arti are also under arrest in the case.
First Published: Saturday, February 11, 2012, 09:05