Back-from-dead tsunami tot going home
(Agencies)
Updated: 2005-02-15 01:03

KALMUNAI, Sri Lanka: DNA test results yesterday confirmed that a baby boy who miraculously survived after being swept from his mother's arms when the Indian Ocean tsunami struck is going home.

Little Abilass in the arms of a nurse. [Reuters]

"Baby 81" was just two months old when he was found under a pile of debris. When word that a baby boy had been found several couples claimed him as their own. But it was the man and woman, later proved to be his mother and father, who persisted and launched a custody fight to be reunited with their son.

The finding, officially announced by a Sri Lankan court, ended weeks of uncertainty and drama surrounding the infant who came to be a symbol of families torn apart by the December 26 tsunami, and set the stage for a reunion on Wednesday with his parents Jenita and Murugupillai Jeyarajah.

"I am so happy, and I only have God to thank for giving my child back," the boy's father said. "We've got the results for all our hardships."

Nine couples originally claimed the boy in the coastal town of Kalmunai. The Jeyarajahs were the only couple to file a formal claim, but they had no documents to prove they even had a child as everything had been swept away.

The court had ruled the baby must stay in hospital until DNA tests could confirm his parentage.

At yesterday's hearing the judge opened the sealed test results, read them aloud and then ordered the couple, hospital officials and baby to appear before the court in two days, said S.H.M. Manarudeen, a children's rights lawyer representing the couple.

"It has been confirmed that the baby belongs to that couple," court official Mohammed Nazir said. "We are about to issue notice to the parents and the hospital summoning them to court on Wednesday."

The child's name is Abilass, and he was born October 19, the Jeyarajahs say. He had been wrenched from his mother's arms when the tsunami hit on December 26.

Rescuers found him amid mud, debris and corpses in the tsunami aftermath. He got his name "Baby 81" because he was the 81st patient admitted to the hospital that day in Kalmunai, 300 kilometres east of the capital, Colombo.

His ecstatic mother plans to fulfill a vow to make an offering by smashing 100 coconuts at a temple of the elephant-headed Hindu god, Ganesh, giving sweet rice to the warrior god, Murugan, and by killing a rooster for the goddess Kali.

The family lost everything they owned, and for a time their son to the tsunami. They are currently living in a camp close to the town.

(China Daily 02/15/2005 page1)

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