A nurse carries ?Baby 81? to the laboratory in Colombo. (AFP)

Colombo, Feb. 9 (Reuters): Sri Lanka?s three-month-old ?Baby 81?, who was found alive among the debris of Asia?s tsunami and became a lightning rod for grieving families, underwent a DNA test today to identify his parents ? and receive a name.

The baby?s plight caused a media storm in Sri Lanka after several bereaved couples flocked to the hospital and offered to take care of him. He was then put under police guard after a couple who say they are his parents tried to forcibly take him from nurses.

The same couple travelled more than 200 km to Colombo for DNA tests themselves ? but will have to wait at least a week for the results.

?The baby?s father calls him: ?My boy Abilash?, but still the name can?t be proved until the test is over,? said S. Manarudeen, the baby?s lawyer appointed by the child protection authority of the eastern district of Ampara.

The couple claiming to be the baby?s parents ? 31-year-old barber Murugupillai Jeyarajah and his wife Jenita ? say the child?s birth certificate and other documents were washed away along with their home by the tsunami.

The infant earned his anonymous moniker because he was the 81st person taken to Kalmunai hospital on Sri Lanka?s east coast after giant waves crashed into the Indian Ocean?s shores on December 26, and swept nearly 40,000 people to their deaths.

Guarded by three armed policemen, the child arrived at the testing laboratory in downtown Colombo in an ambulance, wrapped in a pink blanket and fast asleep on a nurse?s lap. Jeyarajah and his wife Jenita arrived separately, shielded from the press by Unicef officials.