POLICE ON Saturday evening recovered the decomposed body of a 12-year-old Dalit boy, who was allegedly kidnapped while returning home from school at Kotwali area in Bijnor on July 14. Three persons have been arrested. The deceased, Vashu, was kidnapped by his maternal uncle and his three associates for ransom, said police, adding that they killed the boy as they were afraid of being identified. While Vashu’s uncle Raj Kumar and his two associates — Rahul and Lokesh — have been arrested, another accused, Sonu, is still absconding. For the last one week, Vashu’s family had been holding a dharna outside the collectorate office alleging police inaction in the kidnapping case. Raj Kumar had also been protesting alongside the family. Vashu’s father Sunil Kumar works as a compunder at clinic in Bijnor. After Vashu went missing, the driver of the e-rickshaw that took him to school every day, was arrested on charges of conspiracy. “We will soon move court for Mehboob’s release, as no evidence was found against him,” Bijnor SP Umesh Kumar Srivastava said on Sunday. Srivastava added that during probe, police suspected the role of Raj Kumar and his friend Rahul. “We collected the call details of their cellphones and questioned Raj Kumar, who was staging a dharna with Vashu’s relatives. Rahul too gave wrong information about their whereabouts at the time of incident. We became suspicious and decided to question them at length. Both later confessed and said they had kidnapped the body for ransom and killed him as they feared being identified,” he said. “Police later raided thickets of Gangawala village and recovered the body, which was found buried,” added the SP. The body has been sent for postmortem. On Sunday, the three accused were produced before a local court, which sent them to judicial custody. They are all residents of Keeratpur in Bijnor. A native of Rampur Pappli village in Bijnor, Vashu was a student of Class VII. Vashu used to go to school — around 3 km from his residence — on a e-rickshaw driven by one Mehboob. The SP said that during questioning, Raj Kumar told police that on July 14, he and Rahul went to Vashu’s school. “While Vashu was on an e-rickshaw, Rahul followed him on a motorcycle and Raj Kumar in a car. When Vashu reached near his house, Rahul stopped the motorcycle in front of the e-rickshaw. He told Vashu that Raj Kumar had asked him to take him home. Raj Kumar, who was waiting nearby, also waved at Vashu. The boy then left the e-rickshaw and sat on Rahul’s motorcycle,” Srivastava added. “Rahul left his motorcycle and sat in Raj Kumar’s car with Vashu. While they were passing through Gangawal village, they strangled the boy to death. They threw the body in the jungles after cutting Vashu’s head,” he added. Police said that two days later, Raj Kumar, along with his two other friends — Lokesh and Sonu — again visited the crime spot and buried the body in a field. Later, they went to Haridwar and called Vashu’s father for a Rs 10-lakh ransom.
