Swapped At Birth, Parents File Affidavits To Keep Non-Biological Sons

Assam: Two couples, whose babies were accidentally swapped soon after birth over two years ago, have submitted affidavits in a local court to keep the child they have been raising, and sought that the matter be settled.

The issue came to public notice last week after the court fixed a hearing date in the case. Today the couples submitted the affidavits in the court of additional chief judicial magistrate Bonani Goswasmi here about their decision to keep their respective non-biological sons. They said were attached to their child, who knew only them as their parents since birth.

The two sets of parents - one Hindu and the other Muslim -- had doubts within days that the boy they had taken home was not theirs. But it was the Muslim couple that first raised the issue more than two years after the children were born.

Both the boys were born on March 11, 2015 within minutes of each other in the same labour room as per the hospital birth certificate and allegedly got exchanged in the delivery ward, claimed both the sets of parents.

Accepting the affidavits, the court said the two children could decide for themselves which set of parents they would like to live with for the rest of their lives when they attain the age of 18.

The parents informed the court that the child they had brought up as their own since their birth at Mongoldoi Civil Hospital were not their's as revealed in a DNA test done on the children in December last in Hyderabad.

The incident came to public notice on January 5 when they moved court, which gave the date for hearing and submission of their affidavits that the non-biological parents would retain the child that they had brought up so far.

The Muslim family lives in Badilsor village under Shyampur police station in Mangoldoi district, while the Bodo family lives in Munpora Bespora village of the same district. They had filed a case in Mongoldoi police station suspecting the baby they had brought home after his birth was not theirs.

Talking to the press, one child's father, who is a school teacher, claimed that he had filed the case alleging negligence by the hospital after the family failed to receive any response from the hospital and health department authorities. He even showed the DNA test reports to reporters.

The man had also filed an RTI through which he got details about the birth of the two children and the address of the Bodo family.

PTI