Kidnap: Seven-year-old rescued in seven hours

DHNS

• Police nab three teenagers; girl was kidnapped from school

 

Mysore, 25 September 2011: In a sensational incident city police claim to have rescued a seven-year-old girl within seven hours of her kidnap, arresting three teenagers, here on Saturday.

 

The victim has been identified as Pooja, daughter of Veerabhadrappa, New Kantaraja Urs road, K G Koppal in the city. Veerabhadrappa owns a shop dealing with tarpaulin school bags, near his house. The accused are- Avinash, 19, K G Koppal, Pramod and Varun, both 18, and residents of Srirampura in the city.

 

Disclosing this to media in the city, police commissioner Sunil Agarwal said the kidnap episode had all the chances of turning worse, but for the timely and swift action of the police that ended on a happy note.

 

Pooja a second standard student of Christ The King Convent (CKC) on JLB road here, was waiting for her father in front of the school when Avinash came to her around 11.30 am. As is the rotuine, Veerabhadrappa was on his way to school to fetch his daughter.

 

Avinash allegedly told the girl that her uncle Loki (brother-in-law of Veerabhadrappa) was waiting for her. Convinced, the girl went with him on a motorcycle.

 

Meanwhile, shock was in store for Veerabhadrappa who couldn’t find his daughter at the school. When enquired he came to know that ‘pooja went with a youth’. For sometime, Veerabhaddrappa believed his brother-in-law may have taken her and went home. To his utter dismay, he found that Pooja was not at home. Amid this rang his cellphone, with a caller speaking in Kannada; ‘Poojana kidnap madiddivi, amount ready madko” (Pooja has been kidnapped and arrange for the ransom).

 

After dilly-dallying a while, he eventually decided to knock on the doors of Lakshmipuram police around 1.30 pm. After one hour, he got another call from the kidnapper: “ Hunsur case nalli en aythu goththalla bega ondu laksha arrange madko” (you know what happened in Hunsur case, arrange for Rs one lakh). The kidnapper here was referring to the kidnap and murder of two students from Hunsur- H M Sudhindra and H S Vighnesh, whose bodies were found near Chikkaballapur in June.

 

Veerabhadrappa expressed his helplessnesss to arrange for the amount, princely for him, only to bargain with the kidnapper. Finally, the kidnapper settled for Rs 30,000 and a gold chain. He asked Veerabhadprappa to come near Varuna canal at Gorur, where Avinash  and Pramod fell in police net.  However, the girl was not in their possession.

 

Varun, had kept the girl, behind a petty shop near Matrumandali Circle in V V Mohalla.  By 6.30 pm, seven hours after the kidnapping, the incident ended on a happy note. “Till they were caught, especially the first two, they were under the assumption that police is totally unaware. They were taken aback,” the commissioner claimed.

 

Avinash knew about the girl’s family for being a friend of Loki. He also had stolen Rs 500 cash from the shop of Veerabhadrappa one year ago. Veerabhadrappa though aware had preferred not to go to police then, waiting for the time to handle the matter on his own. However, Avinash didn’t return thereafter.

 

The commissioner owed the successful busting of the case to detailed planning in available time. “All the men involved in the operation had to be in mufti not to give any room for the kidnappers about police on trail”, said Agarwal who had all praise for the media too by not going for ‘breaking news’.

 

Pooja told media that she was taken to the canal where she was allowed to play and was also force fed. It was only after she insisted to see her father, she was taken to another place.

 

The operation was led by ACPs- N Vishnuvardhan (K R sub-division) and Shashikumar (CCB), consisting of Inspectors Sooryanarayan Rao and C T Jayakumar among others.