Hindustan Times (Noida)

Woman, 6-yr-old son held at gunpoint, robbed on their way home from school

- Shiv Sunny shiv.sunny@hindustant­imes.com

› Our son was traumatise­d after the incident ... We later told him it was a film shoot involving fake guns. TANVEER KHAN, father

NEWDELHI: A pregnant woman and her six-year-old son were held at gunpoint and robbed by two men on a motorcycle when they were walking back the boy’s school in south Delhi’s Jasola on Monday afternoon, police said.

The masked, gun-wielding robbers allegedly tried to kidnap the boy when his mother said she was not carrying any mobile phone. But she put up a fight, pulled her son from the robbers’ grip and raised an alarm, forcing the men to flee.

“The robbers fired a round in the air and fled as people had begun to gather,” said the woman, Iram Fathima, a homemaker.

Fathima not only lost her gold chain and purse, the incident left her son traumatise­d. “We told him it was a film shoot or a video game involving fake guns,” said the boy’s father, Tanveer Khan, who works with an IT firm.

The police said a case of robbery with attempt to cause grievous hurt and under the Arms Act had been registered at the Sarita Vihar police station, but the suspects remain unidentifi­ed.

“CCTV cameras caught them carrying pistols but they were masked with helmets. Their motorcycle’s registrati­on number plate wasn’t captured clearly,” said a police officer.

Fathima lives with her husband and son in a DDA flat in Jasola. The boy studies at a nearby private school. “My wife is three months pregnant and avoids taking an auto-rickshaw. She walks to and from the school, about 500 metres from our home,” said Khan. She picked up her son around 1 pm on Monday and was walking back when the robbers intercepte­d them near a temple. “It is a busy road at that hour as school buses choose the route,” said Khan.

“Both robbers had guns. They held me and my son at gunpoint and snatched my gold chain. They threatened to shoot my son and took my purse,” Fathima said.

The robbers asked her to part with her mobile phone, which the woman had left at her home. “When I told them I had no phone, they said they were taking away my son and began dragging him,” said Fathima.

“When they began dragging away our son, Fathima’s motherly instinct kicked in and she decided to put up a fight,” said Khan. Her calls for help drew the attention of passersby who ran to her support, forcing the men to flee but not before firing in the air to scare the public.

The woman walked back home and informed her husband after which the police registered a case.

The boy remembers the events even three days after the crime. “Today (Thursday) when my wife went to pick him from school, he asked her if she was wearing a gold chain,” said Khan.

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