A five-day-old girl who was rescued from a sewer where she was left to die in the Indian city of Mumbai is recovering at a local hospital.
Doctors at Rajawadi Hospital told the BBC she was “doing well” and that her health was being monitored.
Police said residents found the baby after cats gathered at a spot along the road and began to meow loudly.
Officials are investigating how it ended up in the sewer.
Pantnagar P.stn received a call from a good samaritan that a baby, wrapped in cloth, was dumped in a drain. He was alerted when the neighbourhood cats created a ruckus. the baby was rushed to Rajawadi by the Nirbhaya Squad of Pantnagar P.Stn & is now safe & recovering. pic.twitter.com/nEGSDCD6wz
— Mumbai Police (@MumbaiPolice) November 15, 2021
Police have not speculated about possible motives, but similar cases of abandonment have been reported in the past in India, where boys are preferred.
Women are often subject to social discrimination and girls are considered an economic burden, especially among poor communities.
The country’s sex ratio is one of the worst in the world. And although most “unwanted” female fetuses are aborted with the help of illegal sex clinics, cases of girls being killed or abandoned after giving birth are not uncommon.
“When we picked up the baby, she was frozen, her hands were blue. We asked for some warm water and a cloth to clean the baby,” Officer Sheetal Sonawane told the Times of India.
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