A joint team of Special Task Force, UP and Bihar police, on Wednesday, arrested nine miscreants who had allegedly kidnapped a prominent doctor and his wife, a week back for ransom from Gaya in Bihar. The couple reached Gaya safely home on Tuesday. Though the senior officers remained tightlipped whether the ransom money was paid or victims were released under police pressure, but sources confirmed that a transaction took place before the couple was set free. Those arrested were identified as kingpin of the gang, Ajay Singh and his aides- Mritunjay Kumar, Beetu Kumar, Vijay Kumar, Amit Singh, Sunil, Amit Kumar, Shrvan Kumar- all of Aurangabad district of Bihar and Anil Singh of Rohtas district of Bihar.
Giving details, Director General of Police (DGP) Arvind Kumar Jain said that the STF raided a flat at the ninth floor of a high-rise Sharda Apartment in posh Gomti Nagar area of the state capital this afternoon. He said during the rescue operation, the police nabbed the criminals, who had kidnapped the couple for a ransom of Rs 15 crore for their release. He said the police recovered three SUV’s including the new Audi car of the couple, red and blue beacons, police uniforms of Jharkhand and Bihar, military man uniforms, belts, police shoes, three sophisticated weapons and a huge cache of ammunitions besides a huge number of vehicle registration number plates, a purse containing ornaments of the victim’s wife.
The DGP said that the police was investigating the owner of flat in which the kidnapped persons were kept. “We are also ascertaining the criminal gang involved in the crime,” he said. Jain said that the kidnappers were tracked through surveillance of the STF in coordination with the Bihar police. “The police collected the details about the Fortuner SUV which was involved in several cases of kidnapping in the past. The police was tipped off about the said vehicle after which the police put a tab on this. During the operation a team of STF sleuths and Bihar police in civvies surrounded the apartment from all sides. The inmates were asked to co-operate and do not get panicked and then the miscreants were asked to surrender and finally they were nabbed,’ he said.
Sources in police department said the couple was tranquilized and were dumped at the Allahabad railway station on Tuesday night. “On regaining their conscious they returned their home,’ they claimed. It surfaced that the kingpin of the gang had executed kidnapping of wife of a Rajasthan jeweler, Sumedha and set her free after realizing the ransom of Rs 2.5 crore. Besides, the same group is suspected to have kidnapped a stone crusher Ravi Ranjan and two his employees on January 22, 2015 and had realized a ransom of Rs 30 lakh for safe release of the victims.
Bihar was on a boiling point over the sensational kidnapping, when a Gaya doctor Pankaj Gupta and his wife Shubha Gupta, who owns a saree outlet were kidnapped on the busy Grand Trunk Road under the Barachatti police station area of the district on May 1. The couple was traveling on their new Audi car from Giridih after attending a marriage function of their relative on May 1 morning and were kidnapped at noon after they crossed the Barhi toll plaza. Doctors and traders organisations in Gaya were holding demonstration against the kidnapping for the past a few days.