MP: Transgender person attacked over child-kidnapping suspicions

A speech-impaired transgender person was assaulted by a mob at Meghnagar railway station in Madhya Pradesh’s Jhabua district for allegedly kidnapping a child.

According to the police, the incident took place on Wednesday night when the person, suspected to be a transgender, was stopped by a local woman whose baby boy was allegedly stolen by unidentified persons from Ujjain railway station three months back. “The woman spotted a person behaving in a suspicious manner near Meghnagar station (around 15 kms from Jhabua) and accused him of being a child-lifter. Her another son claimed that he had seen the person with his brother,” said Government Railway Police (GRP) Assistant Sub-Inspector (ASI) Bathusingh Bilore.

The Asian Age reports that the woman raised an alarm after which a mob gathered at the spot and beat the speech-impaired person and handed him over to the police. Police later realised that the person is mute and cannot speak. Bilore said, adding that they suspect that the person is a transgender.

Police then asked the person to write about his identity on a piece of paper, but he wrote in a script that the police couldn’t read, said the ASI. He said police found cloths of children from the bag of the person whose identity has not been disclosed to the public.

The woman who accused the person of abducting her son from Ujjain hails from Bedawali in Jhabua district, and had come to Meghnagar railway station in search of the missing child, Bilore added. “The woman has claimed that it were her son’s clothing which was found in the person’s bag,” said the ASI. The alleged child-lifter was taken to the Ujjain Mahila (women) police station where the woman had lodged a missing person complaint, he said, adding that further investigation was on.

Also Read: Supreme Court to hear petition against criminalized homosexuality (Section 377)