HYDERABAD, May 7: Hyderabad District Police have detained over 40 people and interrogated 25 other influential people, including a DSP, a caretaker of Bhitshah Rest House, landlords, former officials and other people in connection with the kidnapping of Professor of Surgery, Mohammad Hussain Leghari, but in vain.

Mr Leghari was kidnapped by unidentified persons on April 13 but neither the dacoits contacted his family nor did they contact the police.

Sources close to the family and the police investigators claimed that the family was not hiding anything from the police and the close associates of the kidnapped doctor.

Senior police officials had been visiting the family regularly but could not get any indication that a contact between the family of the doctor and the dacoits had been established.

A police official said that no one had seen the kidnappers or noted the car number in which the doctor was taken.

A source told Dawn that police had identified two to three gangs that might have had a hand in the kidnapping of the professor.

The source added that the area of criminal activity of the dacoits was very wide and these gangs were said to have been operating across the province right from Larkana to Karachi.

A source said that the police had declared Qalandar Bux a suspect in the case but failed to arrest him.

More than half a dozen of his close relatives, including brothers were under police interrogation, the source added.

The police had launched an operation the next day of the kidnapping in the kutcha area and the thick forest of Matiari which had several safe passages for the dacoits, leaving the police to grope in the dark.

Lacking all necessary things and other equipments police team led by District Police Officer (DPO) Hyderabad Moazam Jah Ansari had challenged the dacoits though without any success.

After the encounter, the police got a report that Leghari had been taken to the forest. The different teams of the police, operating in the area, had no modern communication system and bullet proof jackets.

The senior police officials were tight lipped about the progress of the case.

Reports indicate that the senior police officials have divergent opinion about the kidnapping of the doctor.

Former DSP Akbar Panwhar, who under the directives of the additional IG Police, Hyderabad Region, Abdul Rauf Yusuf, is assisting police in investigation and sharing information, claimed that the daughter in law of Mr Leghari and his wife kidnapped were both British national and repudiated the allegations that they had any dispute with the doctor.

The police interrogated Karim Bux Majeedano, the caretaker of Bhitshah rest house, Ali Ahmed Nizamani of Badin, known activists of the PPP-SB and some suspects of Nawabshah, Larkana, Dadu and other places.

The SHO Bhittai Naggar police station, Aijaz Tareen, where the kidnapping case of the doctor was lodged, rejected reports that a deal between the family of doctor and the dacoits had been made.

The general secretary of the PMA, Sindh, Dr Hadi Bux Jatoi, who had organized a seminar on the issue of killings and kidnappings, said that he was also sure that no contact had been established with the family members of the doctor.

He added that the case got so much publicity that even the dacoits were reluctant to come forward with any specific demand.