Solving Crime: When 2 papaya trees and a muezzin’s call helped Thane police solve a 2016 kidnapping case
A friend’s call asking him to visit Bihar for a land deal proved eventful for Khalid Qadri, who was then held captive for days.
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“Near the mosque, we found two papaya trees. We then tracked the room where he had been detained,” an officer recalled. (Representative Photo/Pixabay)In July 2016, Khalid Qadri, a 49-year-old land dealer in Mumbra in Maharashtra’s Thane district, got a call from his friend, asking him to travel to Bihar for a property deal. As soon as Khalid reached Bihar, though, his wife, Shama Qadri, got a ransom call, saying he had been kidnapped. Though Khalid returned safely after the ransom was paid, it was three clues that led the Thane police to arrest the accused: two papaya trees, the voice of a muezzin, and the mobile network of a Nepal service provider.
According to the Thane police, Qadri’s friend Noor Alam called him to Bihar on July 30, 2016, on the pretext of a land deal and then kidnapped him, along with his accomplices. Alam then allegedly made an extortion call to Shama, seeking ransom.
In Mumbra, a worried Shama approached the police, following which a kidnapping case was registered. To ensure Khalid’s safety, Shama paid Rs 30 lakh, after which he was allowed to return to Mumbra on August 5, 2016.
Back home, Qadri met Thane Crime Branch officials, who asked if he remembered anything about where he was held captive. According to a police officer, Qadri told them that the room he was in was situated near a mosque, as he could hear a muezzin’s call for prayers five times a day. He had also seen two papaya trees at a distance, he said.
The other clue that the police had was that the accused had used a Nepal-based mobile service provider to make ransom calls. This had confused the investigating officials as the calls had been traced to Bihar.
When a police team reached the area from where the ransom call was made, however, they found that it had access to the mobile network of a Nepal-based service provider as well. The police thus narrowed down their search to a few villages in the vicinity.
Khalid had told the police that he would be able to identify the muezzin’s voice if he heard it again. The police team then started visiting the villages in the area at different prayer times. After visiting a couple of mosques, Khalid identified a voice as the one he had heard when in captivity. “Near the mosque, we found two papaya trees. We then tracked the room where he had been detained,” an officer recalled.
The police found that the room was owned by one of the accused, who resided nearby. The police then laid a trap and arrested the main accused, Noor Alam, 30, and his alleged aides, Saifiullah Khan, 45, and Irfan Khan, 22. The police also recovered the ransom money that had been paid.
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