She had just returned to duty after a three-month maternity leave, and that was when the policewoman saw another new-born—this one only a few hours old and apparently sinking. Impulsively, constable Archana picked the abandoned child and breastfed it.
In less than half-and-hour, the little boy let out a cry, which resounded as peels of joyous laughter across the Bangalore police station. Archana’s colleagues hailed her prompt act that saved a nascent soul from probable death.
“You know what a joyful occasion it is when a baby is born,” Archana told Outlook on Wednesday, recounting last week’s incident. It was only two months ago she had returned from maternity leave after her first delivery of a child. “When I looked at this orphaned baby, I only thought about what I could do for him. So, I took the little one and breastfed him.”
The baby, which Archana reveals weighed a sufficient 2.5 kg, was then rushed to a government child care centre. There a few personnel from the city police continue to do rounds to ensure the well-being of the infant who was virtually brought back to life. On Friday, the Electronic City police received a call from a local shopkeeper, who quoted a rag-picker in the area having spotted a baby wrapped in a plastic bag and left in the rubble close to a house under construction.
The baby was motionless and in a pitiable condition, according to assistant sub-inspector Nagesh R, who reached location where a small crowd had gathered by then. He brought it to the police station.
The sight of the blood-stained baby with the umbilical cord wrapped around its neck moved Archana. “It was like my child, after all,” said Archana, who immediately breastfed the baby. “Anybody in that situation would have felt the same. In a way, it was my duty too…. The baby stopped crying and went to sleep.”
Once the child showed signs of coming back to life, Nagesh took him to a nearby hospital and brought him clothes. “The baby anyway needed a check-up; also it had bruises,” he said about the medical treatment.
The baby, not much later, got a name too: Kumaraswamy, after the state’s new chief minister. On his part, the CM, H.D. Kumaraswamy, said he was “deeply moved” by the news. In a tweet, he said he would express gratitude to the police constable “who nursed the little one to life”.
The police have registered a case and are on the look out to trace the parents of the child who was found from Celebrity Layout, Doddathoguru. If the mission doesn’t succeed, then the boy will stay at the government shelter, according to CNN.
The Bengaluru City Police lauded Archana, who child back in her home is nine months old. “We salute the Mother in our Lady Police Constable Archana of Bangalore City Police who rescued an abandoned new born and breastfed the infant, she had just returned from Maternity Leave”, said its Facebook post that bore a hashtag: #ThankYouArchana.
