GUWAHATI: Guwahati police cracked a major kidnapping case by rescuing a minor victim girl and arresting the kidnapper, who is a mother of three children, along with her five accomplices, within 12 hours of the abduction.
The accomplices include a madrasa teacher and a panchayat-level Congress leader. The police are probing a militant angle as reports emerged that the kidnappers had plans to hand the seven-year-old abducted girl over to the militants and demand a huge ransom.
The abducted girl, Adishree Dutta, is a student of Class II and her parents, Diganta Dutta and Aminakshi Dutta, are both doctors. They employed the kidnapper, Rumi Das, as a maid on August 3.
Apparently, Rumi took up the job with the intention of kidnapping Adishree.
“Rumi took the child out for ice-cream and a trip to the Saraighat bridge (over river Brahmaputra in the city) around noon on Thursday but never returned. The duo left home in an Ola cab and one of Rumi’s accomplices boarded it on the way,” the police said.
Following the abduction, Rumi had kept her mobile phone switched off but the police learnt that the victim was taken outside Guwahati and eventually, zeroed in on a house at Sarthebari in Barpeta district at night and rescued her.
Apart from Rumi, the five others arrested were Anwar Hussain, in whose house the minor was kept; Congressman Danesh Ali, madrasa teacher Lokman Ali, Nirmal Kalita, who allegedly has an affair with Rumi, and Kalita’s acquaintance Tinku Ali.
The police said the girl was kidnapped for ransom.
“It was a classic case of good planning. A combination of intelligence, science and technology played a part in rescuing the girl and arresting the culprits,” Guwahati Police Commissioner, Mukesh Agarwal, told Express.
He said the police so far got nothing to link the incident to militant angle but hastened to add that they were probing if the girl was kidnapped at the behest of a “third party”.
“We are also trying to find out as to how the six persons got together in the act. One of them, Nirmal Kalita, has a criminal background. On August 3, Rumi was employed by the doctor couple. She had seen their busy schedule and perhaps, that’s how her criminal mind started working,” the police commissioner added.