RAWALPINDI, Nov 29: A woman was arrested at the District Headquarters (DHQ) Hospital for allegedly trying to steal a newborn on Monday.

Riffat, of a Taxila village, was handed over to Ganjmandi police, after she was caught by the security staff.

Pind Dadan Khan’s Rubina, 23, wife of Naseem Iqbal, gave birth to a boy on Monday.

Outside the gynaecology ward, her husband received a call from his brother-in-law on his cellphone. As the caller wanted to talk to his sister, Rubina was asked to come out of the ward.

“After asking an attendant of a patient to keep an eye on the baby, she came out to talk to her brother. But when she returned to her bed, the baby was missing,” Iqbal said.

On hearing the parents’ alarm, the security staff of the hospital and others gathered there.

In the meantime, a newborn baby wrapped in a blanket was spotted on a vacant bed and it turned out to be Rubina’s boy. Riffat, who had allegedly picked up the baby and wrapped him in blanket, was held by the security staff when she returned to the ward for her blanket.

Riffat was taken into custody by the police who are also investigating about an-eight-year-old girl who was accompanying her.

Inspector Raja Akhtar Ali, who is investigating the case, suspected that the girl accompanying the accused might have been kidnapped from the same hospital some 12 months back. However, Riffat claims that the girl was her daughter and she was delivered at the Railway Hospital.

He said the police were trying to verify her statement from the Railway hospital record and her DNA test would be carried out.