Kochi: Even before Kerala could recover from the shock of the brutal assault and murder of the seven-year-old Thodupuzha boy by his stepfather, yet another case of a cruel attack on a three-year-old boy by his parents was reported from Aluva in Kerala's Ernakulam district on Wednesday.
According to police, the child was hit on the head by a wooden stick and he suffered head and brain injuries. He underwent a surgery at a private hospital at Aluva but his condition still remains critical.
The boy has slipped into coma after being allegedly subjected to torture by his mother for being 'disobedient', police said Thursday.
The woman, who hails from Jharkhand, has been arrested under IPC sections 307 (attempt to murder) and Section 75 of Juvenile Justice Act (punishment for cruelty to child).
Both the parents, who are migrant labourers working in Kerala, are in police custody. According to police, the mother, has admitted to injuring the toddler to discipline him.
The boy was brought to the hospital by his father on Wednesday, saying that the child had fallen from his mother’s arms.
The police said the child had been continuously tortured for a prolonged time. The parents allegedly used a hot metal rod to burn him. He was also hit on the head with a wooden stick.
The toddler is the son of a couple living near Old Anavathil Junction at Eloor, Kochi.
The kid has old and new burn marks all over his body. There are other injuries on his legs also. Hospital authorities informed the police after seeing several injury marks on the kid.
The District Child Protection Officer and Childline staff reached the hospital after receiving information from cops.
"The kid has suffered serious head injuries. Right side of the brain is fully damaged. Emergency surgery was performed. His condition is critical," a hospital source said.
There was internal bleeding which has been stopped, and the child was in a comatose state and currently on ventilator support, the source added.
Kerala Health Minister K K Shailaja said the government would bear all expenses of the child's treatment.
She also said a team of experts from the Government Medical College Hospital, Kottayam will reach the hospital for providing better medical care to the child.
The police here said they have contacted their Jharkhand counterparts to get details about the child's family and also to find out whether his father and mother were his biological parents.
A seven-year-old boy from Thodupuzha, who was brutally assaulted by his 'uncle-turned-stepfather', had died in a hospital at Kolencherry on April 6.
The boy was admitted to the ICU of Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church Medical College Hospital at Kolenchery in Ernakulam and was on ventilator support after his mother's live-in partner assaulted him on March 28, leaving him in coma.
The boy, a class 2 student at a school at Kumaramangalam near Thodupuzha in Idukki district, had a two-inch crack on his skull and over 20 injury marks on his body when he arrived at the hospital.
His stepfather was arrested and charged with murder later.
