Jharsuguda: Two persons including a middleman were detained by the Jharsuguda Police for allegedly buying an 11-day-old baby boy for Rs 12,000 in Banjari village of the district.
The police along with the district Childline officials also rescued the baby boy from Balbaspur in Sambalpur after a complaint about child sale was registered.
Ashis Panda, coordinator of Jharsuguda Childline, said, "The middleman has given Rs 12,000 to the parents for buying the child."
After tracing out the parents of the baby, Childline has detained them and kept the baby under its supervision. The parents will be produced before the Child Welfare Committee later in the day, sources added.
It is suspected that due to abject poverty the couple might have sold their child.