Police rescue child shackled in launch terminal
Police yesterday rescued a two-year-old shackled to an iron pillar from the town’s launch terminal area.
The child, identified as Alifa, is the daughter of Sreedevi, 30.
Police said the child’s mother used to beg for money and might have intellectual disabilities.
On information, police rushed to the spot and rescued her and traced the mother, said Md Asaduzzaman, officer-in-charge of Narayanaganj Sadar Model police station.
Mosharraf, a shop owner in the area, said he had been noticing the mother coming to the launch terminal in the morning for the past couple of days. She would shackle the child to an iron pillar in the terminal and then leave.
“The child would sit there, sometimes falling asleep, for hours. The mother would return in the afternoon, untie the child and leave with her,” he said.
Speaking to The Daily Star, Sreedevi said she used to live in Brahmanbaria and came to Narayanganj around five days ago. As she did not have accommodation or relatives living here, she was compelled to chain and leave her daughter at the launch terminal.
After begging during the day, she would take her child back and stay at a shrine in the area at night, she added.
Contacted, Anup Adhikari, court sub-inspector in Narayanaganj, said the mother and child were taken to the district’s Senior Judicial Magistrate Court, which sent them to a women and children development centre in Gazipur.
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