Teacher Dumps 4th Child In Forest Over Government Job, He Survives Under Rock

He cried under the open sky with the cold forest floor for a cradle. His companions in the first hours of life were ants crawling on his skin. This is the story of a three-day-old baby in Madhya Pradesh's Chhindwara, who was pinned under a stone and left to die by his parents.

The infant endured a night of cold, insect bites, and near-suffocation beneath a stone before villagers, alerted by his crying, found him. The cries pierced the silence of Nandanwadi forest at dawn. Villagers pulled the stone away to find a bloodied, shivering infant alive against all odds.

Police say the father, Bablu Dandoliya, a government teacher, and mother, Rajkumari Dandoliya, had decided to abandon their baby because he was their fourth child. Terrified of losing his job under government rules restricting employment for those with more than two children, the couple kept the pregnancy a secret, as they already had three children.

In the early hours of September 23, Rajkumari gave birth at home. Within hours, the baby was carried to the forest and left beneath a stone.

Morning walkers in Nandanwadi village were the first to hear the cries. “We thought it was an animal,” one villager said. “But when we went closer, we saw tiny hands struggling under a stone. No parent should do this.”

Doctors at Chhindwara district hospital confirmed the baby had ant bites and symptoms of hypothermia. “His survival is nothing short of miraculous,” a pediatrician said. “Exposure overnight in this condition is usually fatal.” The newborn is now safe and under medical supervision.

Police have filed a case under Section 93 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) for child abandonment. SDOP Kalyani Barkade said, “We are consulting senior officers. Further sections, including 109 BNS (attempt to murder), may be added after legal review.”

According to National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data, Madhya Pradesh records the highest number of abandoned newborns in India. Poverty, social stigma, and regressive job-related fears drive many such incidents. But experts say this case is particularly chilling because it came not from desperation, but from an educated family choosing silence over responsibility.