Raped 8-month-old stable after surgery

NEW DELHI: The eight-month-old girl, who was sexually assaulted allegedly by her 28-year-old cousin, was reported stable on Monday after she underwent a three-hour long surgery to repair a tear in her private parts.

The baby was rushed to Kalawati Saran Children’s Hospital on Sunday night.

She also had to undergo a colostomy — a surgical procedure that creates a bag in the abdomen with the healthy part of the large intestine or colon to make an alternative route for excretion.

“The procedure has been done so that the baby does not need to pass stool in the normal manner and can heal faster. Depending on her condition, she will have to be brought back to the hospital within next six months or a year to get the procedure reversed,” said one of her treating doctors.

She is in the hospital’s surgical high-dependency unit, a stepdown from the intensive care unit where patients who need more monitoring than in the normal wards are kept. “She is out of danger. If all goes well she will be discharged in five or seven days,” the doctor said.

Delhi Commission for Women chief Swati Maliwal visited the victim on Monday night and gave her parents financial assistance of ₹50,000 on Tuesday. “The child has been injured badly and she kept crying when I visited her. The family is very poor and need support for at least a year or two,” she said.