A newborn baby boy dumped in a banana plantation was rescued by kind locals in Thailand.

The infant still had his umbilical cord attached when he was found by residents lying beneath a pile of banana leaves in Buriram province, at 11 am on February 2.

A housewife named Sae Somkool, 75, said she had been collecting banana leaves to use for cooking when she heard what sounded like a cat's calls coming from the banana grove.

She added: 'I thought a kitten was making the sounds, but it turned out to be a human child. I was so shocked. I called the other villagers to get help.'

Local police arrived at the scene after receiving a report. They found the baby covered in ant bites, with a pair of bloodstained black shorts believed to belong to his mother.

The boy was rushed to a hospital for a check-up. Doctors said he weighed 6lbs and was healthy despite being abandoned.

Plantation owner Kan Sandee, 67, said the area was easily accessible to the public because there were no fences.

She said: 'I heard a dog barking in the early morning at around 4 am. That's probably when the parents arrived to leave the baby here.'

Police launched an investigation to find the boy's parents. A teenage couple soon surrendered themselves to the authorities.

The father, 17, said he had been dating his girlfriend, 16, from another village for around a year. Knowing his parents would not approve, he had kept their relationship secret, but accidentally got her pregnant.

The mother, 16, said she had been sleeping at her boyfriend's house when she suddenly felt stomach pain.

She claimed: 'I had a stomachache, so she went to the bathroom. While I was there, the baby fell out on its own.'

The uneducated girl claimed she 'did not know that she was pregnant' and allegedly confessed to abandoning her child at the base of a banana tree near the house.

Police Colonel Siriwat Somkitsiri, superintendent of the Ban Dan Police Station, said: 'We believe both of them do not have proper knowledge about pregnancy or sex education, which led to the unwanted pregnancy.

‘We will investigate thoroughly with the help of a psychologist who will also focus on their mental health, including the teenagers' parents.

‘They need to process and understand what happened in order to find a solution.'

The police chief added that the mother had suffered a haemorrhage from giving birth and was being monitored by doctors.