IANS

Mumbai, Jan 14 (mb): A Belgian national was arrested Sunday by the Crime Branch of the Mumbai police for allegedly photographing children nude and posting the pictures on the Internet.

The accused, Weldela Noro Gayton, was presented before a holiday metropolitan magistrate and remanded in two days' police custody, a senior crime branch official said.

The police seized Gayton's passport, a camera, a laptop and a memory chip. The police recovered incriminating evidence from the memory chip.

According to the official, Gayton lured poor children from the streets and slums with money and chocolates and promises of giving modelling assignments.

He took them to his 11th floor rented office-cum-residence in the Pacific Building in Andheri (West) suburb of northwest Mumbai. There, he made them strip and clicked their nude pictures. Later, he uploaded them on the Internet.

The police were investigating whether he sexually assaulted any of the children or indulged in sex trafficking.

They are also attempting to verify whether he worked alone or had accomplices in Mumbai, the official said. 

The operation was carried out by the Crime Branch Unit 9 of Bandra early Sunday morning, the official said.