The Bengal CID on Wednesday arrested a local BJP leader - Dr Dilip Ghosh - in connection with the massive child trafficking racket in the state. Dr Dilip Ghosh, not to be confused with the state BJP president with the same name had contested the Bidhan Nagar municipal election from ward number 31 last year. He is reported to have been with the CPM earlier. Ghosh, a doctor by profession, was questioned by the CID on Tuesday over his alleged links to the Sri Krishna Nursing Home in Central Kolkata. He has now been arrested. A resident of Salt Lake, Ghosh is said to have been associated with the nursing home for 21 years. The nursing home was one of the places busted by the CID for trafficking babies.

The racket

According to CID officials, shady NGOs are "supplied" newborn babies by "reputed doctors at state-run medical colleges and nursing homes" who tell the mother she gave birth to a stillborn baby. The NGOs then "lure childless couples under the guise of facilitating adoptions", only to make them buy the babies.

The state BJP president Dilip Ghosh has suspended Dr Ghosh. But his arrest has come as an embarrassment for the party at a time when its leaders were protesting on the streets demanding a CBI investigation into the child trafficking racket.

The CID has arrested four doctors in this connection and after investigation it was found that doctors gave false death certificates of the babies to the couples in the nursing homes where the racket was operating .