In a bizarre revelation, a kidnapper in Palamu has invested the ransom money that he got as his share in the kidnapping as a Fixed Deposit in Bank. The share of `2 lakh was received from the family members of a Government schoolteacher Juwail lakra out of which `30,000 was deposited in a bank by one of the kidnappers, said police.
One of the four kidnappers of lakra, Mandip Chowdhury was caught by police in Palamu’s Ramgarh area on Monday. Mandip not only confessed to his crime but also stunned the police when he said that he had got `30,000 of this ransom deposited with a bank as a term deposit for 12 months in the name of his wife Anita.
DSP Heeralal Ravi said, “Mandip, whom the police caught with another kidnapper Manoj on Monday, has stunned us as he deposited `30,000 with the Vananchal Gramin Bank at Polpol in the form of term deposit in the name of his wife.”
Ravi said police got this TDR terminated and cash worth `30,000 was seized. Mandip’s body search led to another haul of `5,000 in cash.
Mandip’s other accomplice Manoj was caught with `15,000 cash. Thus out of `2 lakh paid as ransom for the release of lakra kidnapped on October 5 and released the very next day, police have recovered a total of `50,000.
The DSP said this is the first instance of its kind where a kidnapper has deposited the ransom money for the sake of his family. He said the kidnapper appears to know the interest coming on the TDR. He added Mandip had a plan to multiply this TDR amount a quite plainly. He said Mandip must have this knowledge that any TDR worth `50,000 and more will have to follow his PAN card and so to avoid any problem he remained contented with TDR worth `30,000 in his wife’s name.
Out of the four kidnappers of lakra two Mandip and Manoj are now in judicial custody while two others are yet to be caught. Police have also seized the bike, one pistol, two bullets from Mandip and Manoj.