A 26-year-old property dealer, who was allegedly abducted on Monday, has been rescued in the early hours of Thursday from Ghaziabad and one of his kidnappers arrested by Delhi Police.
The kidnappers had demanded Rs4 crore as ransom from his Kanpur-based father Harish Chand.
Deputy Commissioner of Police (North-East) RA Sanjeev said, “The incident was reported at Seemapuri police station on Tuesday evening by the victim’s maternal uncle Sunil Kumar Kanojia. Rishabh Verma was rescued within 24 hours at 2.15 am on Thursday from Gagan Vihar in Ghaziabad. One of the kidnappers, Saurabh, has been arrested”.
Police suspect that some close relative had passed on the information about Rishabh to the abductors. Movements of Rishabh must have been kept under close watch for sometime before the plan to abduct him was made. “Investigation is on, role of close relatives, other perpetrators is being investigated and ascertained and some more arrests are likely to be made very soon,” the DCP said.
In his complaint to police on Tuesday, Sunil Kumar had said that he had dropped his nephew Rishabh Verma, a businessman and a realtor at Dr Gulshan Clilnic, New Seemapuri here at 9.00 am. However, the same day he came to know from his brother-in-law Harish Chand Verma that Rishabh has been kidnapped and a ransom call of Rs4 crore has been received in Kanpur at 8.16 pm.
A case was registered and all the phone calls made for demanding ransom, mobile phone numbers of Rishabh, Harish Chand, Sunil Kumar, friends, relatives, business partners and suspects were obtained and analysed.
On the basis of the enquiries, different teams were formed and dispatched to Farrukhabad, Etah, Behta Hazipur (Ghaziabad) and other places in Delhi. The hideout of the abductors was zeroed down to a small room in house no. 216, Gali No. 16A, Jain Complex, Gagan Vihar, Ghaziabad, UP.
“A raid was conducted at 2.15 am on Thursday at the house from where Rishabh was rescued. He was found drugged, hogtied with his mouth gagged. He was found blindfolded in a very poor state of health and hygiene. One of the abductors, identified as Saurabh was apprehended while others managed to escape,” said Sanjeev. During interrogation, Saurabh revealed the name of his other associates as Minto, Sonu, Guddu, Adesh and Sunil.
“On Monday, they had lured the victim into a trap from outside Dilshad Garden Metro Station at about 7.00 pm. They took him to Gagan Vihar on some pretext and confined him in a room. He was administered drugs in milk and forced to consume alcohol. All the perpetrators were promised Rs10 lakh or above as share from the ransom amount,” said Sanjeev.