Chennai: Police on Wednesday arrested a travels firm owner in Purasawalkam for staging a kidnap drama of his three-year-old child and pledging his wife’s jewellery to repay his debts.
P. Ravi Kumar, a resident of Barakka road in Kellys, lived with his wife, Tamil Ilakya, and their three-year-old child, Ganesh. He ran a travel firm in Porur, police said. On Tuesday, Ravikumar informed his wife that unidentified bike-borne men rammed into his two-wheeler and took away their child, while on the way to school.
A few minutes later, he told his wife that the kidnappers contacted him and demanded a ransom of Rs 5 lakh to release their child. Alarmed, the woman contacted her father Paramasivam and pledged her jewels and arranged the cash within a few hours.
Ravi Kumar left the house informing the family that he would hand over the money to the kidnappers and rescue their child. Meanwhile, his wife preferred a police complaint with the Aynavaram police station to trace and arrest the suspects.
Within hours, Ravi Kumar returned home with the child, much to the relief of the family. Police who learnt of this rushed to the home and began interrogating the father when they found him to have staged a kidnap drama.
“Ravi Kumar dropped the child at his friend Venu’s house in Peravallur asking him to take care of the child for a while. Later in the day, he picked up the child and handed over the money to his friend saying that another person named Anand would collect the cash from him. All the while, his friend Venu was unaware of what was happening,” an investigating officer said.
Police said that Ravi borrowed money from one Anand and to repay him, he staged the kidnap drama as he did not want to ask his wife to pledge her jewels. Ravi was arrested and remanded to judicial custody.
