Gorakhpur (Uttar Pradesh), Jul 13 (IANS): A woman has been held for selling her three-month-old son for Rs 50,000 and then faking a kidnapping story.

The police, however, traced the baby within hours of the complaint through CCTV footage.

The mother as well as the woman to whom the baby was sold, have been detained.

Superintendent of Police (SP) city Sonam Kumar said that on Sunday evening, one Salma Khatoon of Ilahibagh area under the Gorakhnath police circle informed the police about the kidnapping of her three-month-old son.

She claimed that a woman, clad in a red sari, snatched away her son near the Shehnai marriage hall in Rasoolpur area and fled in an SUV.

The police reached the spot and launched a search.

"The way the mother was changing her statement raised a doubt. On scanning all CCTVs of the area, the police found that the mother had handed over her son to another woman and then went away in an e-rickshaw. The location of the other woman was traced at Humayunpur road from where police recovered the boy," the SP city said.

Salma's husband is a rag picker and the couple lived in poverty.

Sources said that the mother sold her baby without informing her husband and on being asked by him, she cooked up a kidnapping story.

The other woman claimed that she had bought the baby and had given Salma a sum of Rs 50,000.