Delhi businessman abducted for ₹5 crore, rescued within 30 hrs

CRIME Saurabh Gupta abducted from near his shop in Paschim Vihar, accused had kept the hostage at a flat in Nilothi

NEW DELHI : The owner of one of Delhi’s largest electronics stores chain was kidnapped on Saturday night from near his shop in Jwalaheri Market in Paschim Vihar. The police rescued the businessman from a house in Nilothi in Nihal Vihar on Monday morning, arresting the two accused — one of whom is a former employee of the victim.

Police said the two kidnappers — Satnam Singh and Manish (goes by his first name) — had demanded a ransom of ₹5 crore. Investigators told Hindustan Times that the accused duo had suffered losses in business and wanted to recover money quickly by committing the crime.

They had rented a room in Nilothi for 15 days to keep the victim, 28-year-old Saurabh Gupta, hostage. The kidnappers had given Gupta’s family time till Monday afternoon to pay the ransom. They had threatened to kill Gupta, if the money was not paid.

The police claimed to have cracked the case in nearly 30 hours without a single penny being paid to the kidnappers.

DCP (outer district) MN Tiwari said Gupta was abducted on his way home from near his west Delhi showroom at around 9.30pm on Saturday. He was taken to a rented house in Nilothi village in outer Delhi in his own car. Police said he was held hostage in that house as the two men used his phone to make several ransom calls to his family.

Explaining the sequence of events, Tiwari said, “Soon after the victim left his shop in Paschim Vihar, he saw two men on a motor cycle riding next to his car. He stopped to check what the matter was. The accused first tried to force him sniff something, which led to a brief scuffle. The two then overpowered Gupta at gunpoint. They tied his hands, feet and covered his face before throwing him on the backseat of his car,” said Tiwari.

Tiwari said the men took a circuitous route to Nilothi, even crossing over to Haryana’s Bahadurgarh and made a call from his phone telling his family members that he was safe. Police said this was done to mislead investigators. “After this, Satnam and Manish made 5-6 more calls to Gupta’s home on Sunday, negotiating the ransom amount and finally agreeing for a payment of ₹. 2.5 crore,” the DCP said.

“As the family agreed, they also warned them against telling the police about the abduction. The family, however, sought our help and we had to be discreet about our probe because had they known about police looking for them, they could have murdered Gupta,” the senior police officer said.

The officer refused to disclose how they nabbed the kidnappers but said that investigators took help of technical surveillance of the cell phones.

Police sources said calls to Gupta’s family were made from his phone, which helped them trace the location of the call.

Some sources, however, said that the police had already identified the accused duo and had picked up their family members for questioning.

Through the family members, the police passed on messages to the abductors forcing them to give up their location.

“Both the accused had not been successful in their business and wanted quick money. Manish was previously employed in a godown owned by Gupta at Karol Bagh nearly five years ago,” said Tiwari.