Jammu, June 12: Police Saturday recovered the body of a minor, abducted for ransom allegedly by two local youths, from Gandhi Nagar here.
“Police recovered the throat slit body of Shalin Gupta, a fifth class student, from city outskirts this morning,” a police official told Greater Kashmir.
“Two youth Gagandeep and Davinder Singh had abducted the victim for ransom from Nai Basti last evening. The duo has been arrested,” he added.
“Naresh Gupta, father of the 10-year old victim, had received a phone call, at around 9pm last night , from the kidnappers seeking a ransom amount of Rs 5 lakhs,” sources said.
They said the word about abduction spread like wild fire in the entire area. “Fearing arrest the two accused killed the victim and threw his body on the city outskirts,” sources added.
 Taking cognizance of the matter, police swung into action and detained Davinder Singh, a class 12th student of Nai Basti, on basis of suspicion. “Davinder was questioned but nothing came out of his interrogation. He was set free.”
 However, family members of the victim and some locals reportedly barged into a Gudwara at Sarwal and handed over another accused Gagandeep Singh to police. “He broke down during interrogation and confessed that he had Davinder Singh were involved in Shalin’s killing and subsequent abduction. He also identified the PCO vendor, from where the ransom call was made,” sources said.
 They said Police arrested Davinder again and both the accused disclosed that they had slit the throat of the child and had dumped the body in Beli Charana area.

PROTESTS
 The vehicular movement along Jammu-Pathankot highway remains suspended for over 3-hours following strong protests by the family members of the deceased child and inhabitants of Nai Basti area immediately after the body of the child was recovered, this morning.
 Thousands of people blocked busy Bikram chowk road and burnt tyres, besides shouting anti-police slogans. The protesters also smashed windshields of some vehicles, eyewitnesses said.
 Senior police officers rushed to the spot and pacified the protestors.

HOUSE SET ABLAZE
 Angry mob set ablaze the  house of main accused Davinder Singh. Though the house suffered considerable damage, family members of the accused had already left the spot.
 Probe ordered
 Succumbing to the pressure the district administration ordered a probe into the killing and why the main accused was released after being detained initially. The administration also sanctioned exgratia relief of Rs 1 lakh for the victim’s family.

ACCUSED INSPIRED BY SOME BOLLYWOOD: POLICE
 The Deputy inspector General of Police Jammu-Kathua Range Farooq Khan on Saturday claimed that accused were inspired by some Bollywood movie and resorted to the criminal means to earn some quick bucks.
 “Police swung into action as soon as it received the report about kidnapping from independent sources,” Kahn told a news conference here.
 “We arrested the accused with the cooperation of some relatives of the victim”, he said, “However, at the same time it is regretted that the information was not shared with us in time, which led to the delay”.
 The DIG said that the family members refused to confirm the kidnapping and ransom call even when a police team visited their house, after receiving the information from its own sources.
 He further claimed that the accused killed the child immediately after kidnapping him. “Fearing arrest the accused slit open child’s throat”.
 Khan said that the ransom call was made after killing the victim.
 The DIG said that the life of the child could have been saved had family shared the information with police in time.

Lastupdate on : Sat, 12 Jun 2010 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Sat, 12 Jun 2010 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Sun, 13 Jun 2010 00:00:00 IST