LAHORE, June 29: Shahdara police on Wednesday claimed to have arrested six members of a gang involved in kidnapping a citizen for ransom and recovered from them Rs300,000, a car, five cell phones and illegal weapons.

A police team was constituted by City SP (Operations) Dr Shahzad Asif to trace the criminals who had kidnapped Mazhar Bokhari about a week back for a ransom of Rs30 million. However, he was released after paying Rs300,000 ransom.

The police team tracked down the kidnappers and arrested ringleader Siraj alias Bhayya and his five accomplices Tariq Mahmood, Awais Hasan, Barkat Masih, Tariq and Aslam from a Shahdara locality.

Police also recovered the ransom amount and the car used in kidnapping. Two other accomplices Imtiaz and Javed managed to flee.

Mazhar was lured by ringleader Siraj on the pretext of a business deal and was abducted at a place on GT Road in Shahdara.

The arrested criminals were handed over to the investigation police for further interrogation.