A desperate 35-year-old woman is appealing for help after she lost her teddy on a busy street in the city centre.

Neha Shah and her husband Ashish Gaur were going to dinner in Manchester city centre with their teddy Baboo when he fell out of her bag and was lost.

Neha said: “I took him out my bag to kiss him and I think he must have fallen out after that.”

Heartbroken Neha, who is from Blackpool and was visiting the city for work, searched for her teddy for three hours with her 45-year-old husband.

The couple even reported the missing bear to the police.

Neha is now appealing to anyone who may have picked up the teddy to return him to his doting mother.

The 35-year-old said: “He goes everywhere with me. I walk around with him in my arms like a baby.

"Baboo eats with me and sleeps in the bed with my husband and I.

“He has travelled with me around the world to Hong Kong, around Europe, to Thailand – he even has his own suitcase as I have so many different outfits for him.

“I fell in love with him basically and my husband loved him eventually as well. He has huge sentimental value,” she added.

Baboo the bear, who has a Union Jack on one of his legs and is dressed in a blue onsie with a picture of a daisy on the chest, was lost on Portland Street on Tuesday June 23 between 5pm and 5.30pm.

The light coloured teddy also has a red mark on his head.

“I am traumatised. I haven’t stopped crying since yesterday. My husband is also upset,” she added.

“I know I can buy another one of the same teddies for around £8 but I fell in love with this one and I don’t know if I would fall in love with a different one,” said Neha, who works at the Best Western Carlton Hotel, in Blackpool.

Neha was given the bear four years ago by a friend who returned to India on the 16th July.

The couple now celebrate Baboo’s birthday on that date and she is desperate to find him with his July ‘birth’ only weeks away.

A spokesman in Greater Manchester Police’s city centre office confirmed that the lost teddy had been reported to them.