March 24, 2006	Friday	Safar 23, 1427

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RAWALPINDI, March 23: In one of the most heinous crimes in the city’s history, kidnappers of a small boy shot dead his uncle on Thursday who had brought them Rs1.5 million in ransom and escaped with the money - unnoticed by the police vigil and without freeing their nine-year-old victim.

The bloody drama, played in the jurisdiction of the Civil Lines police, shocked the citizens and the political circles as Tanveer Ahmed, the man who paid with his life for the love of his nephew, was the deputy secretary-general of Pakistan Awami Tehrik (PAT) party. He was also associated with a private television channel.

“That the criminals could act so brazenly shows that the law and order has hit rock bottom,” commented a citizen, praying for the safety of the boy Waleed Ahmed who was kidnapped on March 18.

His parents could get an FIR registered with the Sadiqabad police only on March 21. Meanwhile they continued their desperate search for their son.

The kidnapper contacted the parents and demanded Rs2.5 million in ransom. Eventually the ransom was settled at Rs1.5 million and on Wednesday midnight the kidnappers directed them to bring the ransom near Liaquat Bagh with the warning that the boy would be killed if they informed the police.

Police said when Tanveer Ahmed, 45, reached Liaquat Bagh, the kidnappers called him again and directed him to reach near the Punjab House at Kutchery Road where they would hand him over the abducted boy.

“Though the parents of the boy asked us to let them go alone, we still cordoned off the kidnappers’ possible escape routes like Mareer Chowk, Kutchery Chowk and Jhanda Chichi,” DSP Investigation Rana Shahid said.

Tanveer Ahmed reached the designated place near a CNG station where he received another telephone call from the kidnappers a little before dawn and he went into a street.

So far the police had been covering Tanveer but lost him when he vanished into the streets, the police officer said.

As time passed, police’s concern for Tanveer grew and it called Tanveer on his cell phone which did not respond.

Alarmed the police party started searching for him and finally found him lying in a pool of blood in a street with no trace of the criminals.

“We had been covering Tanveer and had cordoned off some areas, but the culprits vanished from the scene,” the DSP said.

According to a doctor who carried out postmortem of Tanveer, said the victim died of a single bullet shot.

Concern for the kidnapped boy has heightened since the cold blooded murder of his uncle. Waleed Ahmed, a 4th class student at Faisal Model School, Sadiqabad, is the son of a bank employee Syed Shahab Ahmed. He was kidnapped from outside his house in Muslim Town on March 18.

On the following day, the parents received a telephone call from the kidnappers who demanded ransom to be delivered in Peshawar. In later contacts they changed the venue.