By IANS
Patna : The Bihar government has asked the London police to test the DNA samples to ascertain the parentage of a nine-year-old boy of Indian origin found in a London bus stop last week.
A family in Bihar’s Aurangabad district claimed that the boy was their child, Sintu, kidnapped three years ago. The boy was wearing a Sikh-style turban when the police found him.
The Bihar government, on its part, will match the boy’s DNA with those of the couple from Bihar who claimed that the nine-year-old was their son.
“Bihar’s director-general of police A.R. Sinha personally contacted the Indian High Commission in London and requested that the boy’s DNA should be tested to determine his identity so that he could be reunited with his family if he was their lost son,” police spokesperson Anil Kumar Sinha said here Friday.
The spokesperson said only a DNA test could solve the case. “The state government is waiting for a response from the Indian high commissioner in London.”
He said the Bihar police would test the DNA of the boy’s mother.
Ganga Prasad, who claimed to be the boy’s father, said Wednesday: “We want a DNA test because we are sure that he is our son.
“The boy found in London is our Sintu, kidnapped three years ago.”
He reportedly identified his son after seeing a few photographs of the boy on a television news channel.
The television footage has brought a ray of hope to the family, nearly three years after the boy was kidnapped from Aurangabad town. “Our hopes rekindled after we saw photographs of the boy. He is definitely our Sintu,” Basant Prasad, the boy’s grandfather, said.
Everybody in the family was now hoping that Sintu would return home, he said.
According to family members, Sintu was abducted from Kikri under Sadar police station March 3, 2005 when he was playing outside his home. “He was then six years old,” Ganga Prasad said.
Police lodged an abduction case March 6, 2005 but they could not find the boy.
Sintu’s uncle Gaya Prasad said Sintu’s maternal uncle Upendra Singh, who runs a business in Orissa, told the family Sunday night that they saw Sintu’s photographs on a television news channel. “There is no doubt that he is our boy,” Gaya Prasad said.
“His nose, eyes and face were similar to that of our child at the time when he was kidnapped.”
Mother Bindia Devi is the happiest because she is sure that her lost son will return. “It is a miracle for us,” she said.
The family had lost faith in the police after they failed to make any breakthrough in tracing the abducted boy.
Sintu is the nephew of Rashtriya Janata Dal legislator Bhim Singh, who is close to Railway Minister Lalu Prasad and his wife Rabri Devi, the former chief minister and currently leader of the opposition in the state assembly.
“I have requested chief minister Nitish Kumar and the state police chief, A.R. Sinha to help bring the boy back from London,” Singh said.
The legislator said he suspected that after being kidnapped, Sintu was sold off to a childless non-resident Indian couple and was later taken to London.