An Indian mother who offered to sell her baby to a childless couple for £35,000 in a case of modern-day slavery has been jailed for seven years

The married Indian woman was ready to abandon the 11-month-old girl with the buyers in a hotel room when police swooped. A Pakistani businessman acted as a middleman, brokering the sale and promising a name-change with a fake birth certificate for the new parents. But the purchasers turned out to be undercover reporters from a Sunday newspaper, Inner London Crown Court heard. The businessman, 48, turned up with the 29-year-old mother, with babe-in-arms, for the handover after a series of taped phone conversations. The woman's 31-year-old husband, who was not the baby's father, was cleared of involvement in the conspiracy. Unknown to them, police were listening in the next room and waiting for the signal from the reporter. The mother and the businessman, who is a successful estate agent, were convicted of child cruelty and slavery over the unvetted adoption for profit. The businessman was jailed for nine years.