KARACHI: Two suspected kidnappers were killed in a shoot-out with police in Defence Housing Authority on Tuesday, leading to the safe recovery of a five-year-old boy they had picked up while the child was on his way to school in the morning. The criminals had demanded Rs150 million as ransom, officials said.

The hours-long agony of the parents as well as the boy came to an end in the second half of the day when the child kidnapped early in the morning returned home unhurt in the afternoon. The police said that it all began when gunmen intercepted a chauffeur-driven car outside their home on Khayaban-i-Tariq and took away the boy.

“Two armed men took away the boy and another two got into the car of the family and drove away with the father of the boy,” said SSP South Sarfraz Nawaz Shaikh. “They drove the father of the boy towards Korangi in his car and demanded Rs150m as ransom for the safe return of his son. They then left him in his car abandoned in an isolated neighbourhood of the Korangi Industrial Area. Police were finally approached by the family who initiated the investigation using all technological support and started surveillance.”

In the meantime, the SSP South said, the family stayed engaged in negotiations with the suspects to settle the amount of ransom which helped police gain time and trace the location of the kidnappers. The two sides finally agreed on Rs7m and by that time a police team spotted a suspicious car moving non-stop in the remote Phase VIII of DHA for more than an hour. The police party finally chased the car and intercepted it on a one-way road, he added.

“The armed men in the car attacked personnel of our team when they were busy taking positions. The attack led to retaliation from our side, which triggered an exchange of gunfire. Though two persons inside the car ran away under the cover of intense firing, leaving the child behind, their two accomplices were killed in the shoot-out,” said the SSP South.

The killed kidnappers, he said, were later identified as Nadeem and Shahid, who were wanted in several cases of short-term kidnapping between 2011 and 2013, he said, adding that investigations were on to trace and arrest the rest of the gang members.

Newlywed couple found shot dead

A newly-married couple were found shot dead inside their home in Shah Latif Town less than a week after they had tied the knot under free will in a tribal area and moved to Karachi due to death threats, police said.

They said the area people in Madina Colony, within the remit of the Shah Latif Town police station, approached the police in the morning after they found the bodies of 24-year-old Sher Ameen and his 22-year-old wife, Sajida, following sounds of multiple gunshots.

“The couple had rented a two-room home in the area only two days ago,” said an official at the police station. “They originally hailed from Khyber Agency and came to Karachi after getting married on April 19 as their families opposed their marriage, posing serious threat to their lives. It’s an early morning incident. The neighbours said that they heard multiple gunshots and by the time they had identified the place of firing, the attackers had escaped. The incident appeared [to be a] result of the same family feud. The bodies were moved to the Edhi morgue after medico-legal formalities at the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre.”

Published in Dawn, April 25th, 2018