No trace of missing Bengaluru techie, left home to meet OLX buyer for car

Bengaluru: It’s been a week and there is still no trace of the 29-year-old software engineer from Patna who had gone missing from the Whitefield Area in Bengaluru under mysterious circumstances on December 18.

Ajitabh Kumar, who worked at British Telecom, left home around 6:30 pm last Monday.

Friends of Ajitabh suspect that he might have got a call from a prospective buyer for his car that he had put up on sale on the online marketplace OLX.

There is no trace of Ajitabh’s vehicle and his phone is also switched off. The police are analysing CCTV footage from the area and nearby toll plazas as well.

Friends of Ajitabh say he was last active on WhatsApp around 7:10 pm on the same day, but soon his number got switched off with the last location of the mobile phone being Gunjur near Whitefield.

"We are investigating all angles. We have sought data from the online classified portal as well. We have obtained his call record details as well," NDTV quoted a police officer who is the part of the investigation.

The police said the investigation so far has not suggested anything out of the ordinary in Ajitabh's personal and professional life.

Ajitabh moved to Bengaluru in 2010 and since then he has been staying with his childhood friend Ravi in Whitefield.

Ajitabh wanted to sell his car to join Indian Institute of Management (IIM) in 2018 as he had passed the interview.

"He had got through for an executive MBA program at IIM (Indian Institute of Management), Kolkata. He had to pay around Rs 5 lakh by the 20th and we guess that's why he had put up his car for sale to fund his fee. When he left home, he was in casual wear and didn't tell anyone where he was going," Ravi said.

Ajitabh had bought a Maruti Ciaz car by paying Rs 12 lakh and he had quoted Rs 11.8 lakh on OLX a couple of weeks ago. He had also applied for a loan with a private bank to join IIM, The New Indian Express reported Ajitabh’s brother Arnabh as saying.

“We suspect that he might have been kidnapped by some unknown people on the pretext of buying the car. There is no reason why he should disappear like this. He had no issues with family or friends,” Arnabh said.

Ajitabh's friends and relatives have launched an online campaign to find him.