A four-month-old baby boy who was swept from his mother’s arms in the Boxing Day tsunami was today handed back to his parents at last in a joyous courtroom reunion.

The child dubbed Baby 81 has been at the centre of an eight week custody battle after nine women claimed him as their own. His identity was finally established earlier this week by DNA tests.

A smiling Jenita Jeyarajah took her son, Abilass, from a doctor’s arms after she and her husband, Murugupillai, approached the bench in a courtroom packed with onlookers. The baby was dressed in blue clothes and a pink cap.

"Look how happy he is! He knows the scent of his parents," Murugupillai Jeyarajah said later. "After returning to us, he still hasn’t cried."

The reunion concluded a drama that captured hearts in Sri Lanka and around the world, and came two days after a judge confirmed the infant’s parentage with DNA test results.

Initially, eight other couples had tried to claim the baby.

Moments after Wednesday’s brief proceedings, the couple and Abilass left in a Unicef vehicle to a local hospital, where the family prayed at a Hindu temple and the father smashed a coconut to fulfill the couple’s vows for their son’s return.

He carried the baby around the shrine, as other family members chanted prayers and raised their hands in a sign of worship. Shortly after, they left for another temple dedicated to the elephant-headed Hindu god Ganesh, where Murugupillai Jeyarajah smashed more coconuts and circled around the shrine twice with the baby.

He said the family would visit more temples around Kalmunai today, to fulfil his promises to cook sweet rice and offer it to the warrior god Murugan, and to slaughter a rooster for the goddess Kali.

The relieved parents also paid a brief visit to the rubble of their destroyed home, where the raging waters had pulled the boy from his mother’s arms. A villager recovered Abilass Jeyarajah from mud and debris hours later on December 26, and brought him to the hospital, where he became the day’s 81st admission, earning him the nickname "Baby 81".

"I want to teach my child well and bring him up as any other parents would," Murugupillai said, cradling the boy in his arms.

He said he planned to stay with Abilass for 4 or 5 days before returning to work as a barber.

The couple initially was unable to prove the boy was theirs because their home and family records were swept away by the tsunami. The court had ordered the boy kept in the hospital until the DNA results came in.

At Wednesday’s court proceedings, Kalmunai Judge MP Mohaideen officially declared the couple to be the boy’s parents, apologized for any inconvenience from the prolonged case and wished Abilass a prosperous future.

He said the court process had been necessary to ensure that the boy could have a normal life and that he wasn’t claimed by the wrong parents.

According to UN estimates, children accounted for 40 per cent, or 12,000, of Sri Lanka’s tsunami death toll of nearly 31,000. About 1,000 children were orphaned by the tsunami and another 3,200 lost one parent.

It has been a very difficult seven weeks for the Jeyarajahs. At one point, they barged into the Kalmunai hospital to try to reach the baby and were briefly detained by police after a scuffle with the staff. The father threatened to commit suicide unless the baby was returned to them.

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