By IANS,
Lucknow : Craze for flashy mobile phones and a zippy bike prompted a group of teenaged youth to kidnap a five-year-old boy in Uttar Pradesh’s Kaushambhi district for a ransom of Rs.5 lakh. Police said Wednesday the culprits have been arrested.
The abductors, aged between 15 and 17 and studying in classes 9 to 11, were arrested Tuesday and the five-year-old victim was handed back to his family involved in cloth business in Kaushambhi.
“The boy was rescued from a hideout on the outskirts of the district,” Inspector R.R. Singh told reporters Wednesday in Kaushambhi, some 250-km from Lucknow.
“The five kidnapped the boy Sunday and demanded a ransom of Rs.5 lakh from his family,” said Singh.
“The kidnapped boy and all the five abductors are residents of the Puramufti town. The abductors live close to the boy’s house,” he said.
According to police, the culprits have admitted that they kidnapped the boy to purchase costly mobile phones and a bike with the ransom.