Pramesh Jain
Kolar police have arrested six habitual offenders including Kaviraj associate of Ravi Pujari and cracked the kidnapping case of former MLA Varthur Prakash.
Close to a month of painstaking investigation, the Kolar police cracked kidnap case of former minister Varthur Prakash and arrested a gang of six habitual offenders.
Seemamth kumar Singh,Inspector General of police,Central range,who supervised the investigation,told reporters here that the accused Kaviraj is habitual offender having over 10 criminal cases in and around Bengaluru and Tamil Nadu.
The accused hailed from Himachal Pradesh but settled in Hosur working real estate and land broker. He formed a gang identifying people with money and abduct them to ransom.
Recently he came to know about Mr.Prakash business venture and decided to target. As per the plan,he abducted Prakash and his driver and demanded Rs 30 crore before settling it for Rs. 48 lakh.
The police who took up the investigations analyzed the CCTV footage at the coffee shop where the ransom was paid.
The police have also analysed call record details of the accused phones zeroing in on the accused identified as S Likhith,Ullas,Manoj,Raghavendra and Praveen.
The police have also seized a bike used to get the ransom amount two cars,lethal weapons and cash Rs. 20.5 lakh from.The accused.
The police continue massive manhunt for others accused who are on the run.Mr.Singh said that five special teams have been formed to probe the case.
Kaviraj was operating from outside and giving instructions to his associated over the phone.After his associates were arrested the police used one of the accused as bait to track down Kaviraj.
After his associate was asked by police to call him to come near Madhurai to meet him.kaviraj came to the spot but suspecting fishy he tried to escape.However the police chased him.For few kilometers in a car and arrested him.
However the associate of Kaviraj escaped from police custody.We have taken kaviraj into custody for further investigation Mr. Singh added.
