Sholapur’s Baby Dropping 2009

Indian officials allowed hundreds of babies to be dropped from the roof of a mosque in the belief it would ensure good health and prosperity.

The ritual at the Baba Umer Durga, a Muslim shrine, is believed to have been followed for nearly 700 years, and each year hundreds of people, both Hindus and Muslims, take part.

Infants, most under two years old, are dangled from the roof of the shrine near Sholapur, 450km south of Mumbai, before being dropped about 15m onto a bedsheet held aloft by parents and other believers.

Television channels showed the babies screaming as they were shaken in the air before being dropped.

Officials said there had been no reports of any injuries at this year’s event.

‘Irrational’ behaviour

With high child mortality rates, especially in India’s rural areas, many people resort to rituals which they believe can ensure their children’s health.

Children’s rights activists expressed outrage after the Headlines Today television channel showed the babies being dropped.

“This shows the complete failure of the local administration to prevent this practice and to create awareness about children’s health,” said Ranjana Kumari, a civil rights activist in New Delhi.

“It is also a reflection of the lack of access to health services, that forces people to behave in this irrational manner,” Kumari said.

India’s National Commission for Protection of Child’s Rights issued a notice to the local administration in Sholapur and has begun investigations into the practice.

I don’t think access to health service for kids will help this issue; if you are stupid enough to think that dropping your few months old baby from 50 feet, causing him a whiplash and possible permanent brain injuries will ensure his health then go ahead you don’t need medical access.

Have you notice that this year they shake the babies before dropping them? Why is that? They also have clothes and seem a bit older… Of maybe it was simply the 2nd group, the 1 and up?

Sholapur’s Baby Dropping 2008

This poor MSNBC anchor was just trying to report on the story about some little kids at a daycare surviving a tornado in Windsor, Colorado but instead of talking to someone live, all you can hear is a producer swearing and screaming. Yikes! We hope they enjoyed their career while it lasted…

A 10-year old’s driving services were requested by 43-year old Randy Lewis (that’s actually him in the picture, he was really wearing that shirt) and Paula Elaine Evans because they were too drunk to drive themselves. Other passengers included another 10-year old and a 6-year old. However, the driver lost control of the van at 90MPH and flipped it, before it finally came to stop on its roof.

Thankfully, all five individuals where released from the hospital with minor injuries, and Lewis and Evans (the adults could have died for all I care) both went to jail for charges ranging from child endangerment and neglect to DUI, a charge which can be levied in Tennessee even if you aren’t behind the wheel. After a performance like that, we sincerely hope nobody ever buys that dad a beer ever again.

When the authorities arrived on the scene, Lewis admitted to having consumed at least 15 beers as well as somealcohol while Miss Evans pounded down as many unidentified pills as she could before police arrested her.

Wow, making a 10-year old drive you home because you’re wasted? That’s just sad. I think we can all agree here that designated drivers should at least be 11½. You know, so they can reach the pedals.

Dad had gone out to get coffee and breakfast. Mom was helping their 4-year-old son on the toilet. Their 9-year-old daughter was playing Nintendo.

That was how the morning of Jan. 3 played out for the Wolfe family of Massachusetts inside Room 142 of the Homewood Suites in Mount Laurel, Burlington County. Soon, the Wolfes would pack up and finish their long drive home from Florida.

But, wait: The couple’s 22-month-old son was supposed to be on the hotel’s pull-out sofa, watching TV. Instead, according to a federal lawsuit filed this week in New Jersey, the toddler was choking on a used condom that had been left in their room before they checked in.

When Amy Wolfe heard her youngest child chewing and choking on the condom, she rushed over to help him and retrieved it from his mouth, but according to the lawsuit, the boy already had “ingested the contents.”

The suit contends that Homewood Suites and its subsidiaries, Hilton and Blackstone, put the boy at risk by leaving the “life threatening” item in the room and subjecting the boy to an increased risk of contracting a “sexually transmitted disease, including HIV or AIDS, or some other, potentially life threatening, potentially fatal illness.”

“The baby had to go through a lot of testing, and continues to, because of this disgusting, horrific incident that essentially violated the whole family, but mostly the young boy,” said the Wolfes’ attorney, Norm Hobbie, of Eatontown, Monmouth County. “It’s an extremely sensitive time for them.”

Homewood Suites did not return phone calls or e-mail seeking comment on the suit yesterday.

The 15-count complaint contends that all five Wolfes suffered severe mental anguish witnessing the incident, and that the boy’s siblings likely would have “psychiatric scars” because of it.

It says that Steven Wolfe has been forced to spend “great sums of money” to help cure his wife of a “loss of enjoyment of life.”

The suit says the Wolfes had been en route to Pittsfield, Mass., after spending the holidays with relatives in Fort Myers, Fla.