KARACHI: Police on Wednesday claimed to have arrested two suspects allegedly involved in the last year kidnapping of two girls in Defence Housing Authority.

The two girls — Bisma and Dua Mangi — were abducted in May and November last year by armed men travelling in a car. Both the incidents shocked the people not only living in the upscale Defence area but all across Karachi.

Speaking at a press conference at his office, Karachi police chief Ghulam Nabi Memon said that the police arrested Muzaffar alias Moozi and Zohaib Qureshi and recovered arms from them.

Their three accomplices identified as Agha Mansoor, Shakeel and Kamran alias Kami were still at large, he added.

During interrogation, the held suspects ‘confessed’ to their involvement in the girls’ kidnappings and said that absconder Mansoor had planned these kidnappings.

The suspects had previous criminal record as they were also involved in snatching of vehicles in the city, he said.

Absconding suspect Mansoor was a former police officer and he was dismissed from service due to his involvement in criminal activities, the police chief said.

He said that the kidnappers had rented an apartment in Clifton Block-2 a year ago where they kept both the girls after abducting them.

The city police chief said that both the girls were kidnapped for ransom.

The Karachi police, Rangers, citizen-police liaison committee and intelligence agencies had made collective efforts and worked on different aspects of the cases, he added.

He said that a perception was ‘built up’ after the kidnapping of Dua Mangi that the state appeared helpless before the kidnappers and could not trace and arrest the culprits.

He said that the perception was not a reality as the police and all other institutions took concerted efforts, which ultimately led to the arrest of the two suspects.

He disclosed that the police had recommended to the Sindh government to announce a Rs5 million cash reward on the arrest of the remaining three suspects.

The city police chief declared that the law enforcers would provide security to both the victims of kidnapping.

It may be recalled that Bisma was abducted outside her home in DHA by armed men travelling in a car on May 12, 2019. She returned home after a week following payment of ransom.

Apparently, the law enforcers had ‘overlooked’ the first kidnapping incident and in another shocking incident on Nov 30, another girl, Dua Mangi, was kidnapped by armed men in the DHA’s Khayaban-i-Bukhari. The kidnappers first shot her friend, Haris Soomro, when he resisted the kidnapping bid.

The girl was freed after one week on payment of the ransom amount.

DIG-CIA Arif Hanif told Dawn that the mastermind of these kidnappings was former police officer Agha Mansoor. “He is a hardened criminal who had remained involved in other kidnapping-for-ransom incidents in the metropolis,” he said.

Published in Dawn, March 19th, 2020