Techie kidnap kingpin nabbed

KOLKATA: Police wrapped up the Sandipan Das abduction case, arresting taxi driver Sanjoy Pal the mastermind early on Wednesday from his home. Pal (32) is the third cabbie to be nabbed in the case.
Police labelled Pal the kingpin and said he was responsible for planning the kidnapping and negotiating the ransom amount with the techie's family. After his arrest, police recovered Rs 1.91 lakh of the ransom amount from Pal's home.
It was revealed that Das's presence of mind had helped the sleuths crack the case.After being abducted, he was blindfolded and taken via a circuitous route to Pal's flat in Baranagar, where he was held hostage. Taking various twists and turns, Pal managed to throw Das's family members, who were following in a car, off his trail.
But Pal's luck ran out when Das, a Capgemini executive, managed to tell police the exact route the gang took and the location of the flat. He listened to the conversation of his abductors to gauge their moves. He also learnt where some of them lived.
"He is a very intelligent man. He even counted the stairs of Pal's apartment and told us its exact location. He told us about the homes of other gang members. It was his intelligence that helped us get the better of his abductors," said an investigator who raided Pal's flat at 11, Akshay Kumar Mukherjee Road.
Apart from Pal, police also arrested petty criminals Manoj Bag (30) and Amit Das (31) from Howrah's Salap on Wednesday. They had cases pending against them in Hooghly, Howrah and North 24-Parganas and helped Pal in the abduction. The total number of arrests in the case now stands at five, with cabbies Md Ehsan and Ash Md held earlier.
Police said that of the total Rs 2 lakh paid as ransom, Pal had distributed Rs 10,000 among gang members and the rest was recovered from his home.
Police said Pal was also involved in the December 2009 abduction of a Sony-Ericsson employee from Salt Lake's Sector V. He had received
Rs 1.5 lakh in ransom from the employee's family after demanding
Rs 15 lakh. His mother and brother used to stay with him but left for their ancestral home in Belpahari, West Midnapore, after they got to know of his criminal deeds. Since then, Pal used to live alone in his third-floor flat. The Sony-Ericsson employee was also held captive there.
Pal earlier drove a cab owned by another person. But in 2009, he bought a new taxi after taking a loan. "When we asked him what drove him to kidnapping, he said he needed money to repay the loan. He formed a gang, recruiting Manoj and Amit from Howrah and Ash Md and Md Ehsan from Baranagar," said a police officer.
Senior officers probing the case said that Ehsan had intentionally stopped the cab near the Wipro connector to let the other gang members board the taxi. As soon as the cab stopped, Manoj and Amit barged in and knocked Das down with a revolver butt. He was blindfolded and taken to a hideout near Baranagar railway station.
Pal received the ransom alone and asked Das's wife Rimi not to fret. Rimi and Das's uncle Debu had followed the taxi for some time but from Tobin Road, Pal drove on to BT Road to confuse those on his trail.
Police contacted North 24-Parganas taxi union to get all registration numbers of taxis that were suspected to be used by criminals.
Police also learnt that Pal had hijacked a taxi for two abductions he carried out in the past. But he did not use that vehicle for Das's abduction. "Pal's intelligence beat us. But Das's intelligence helped us beat the kidnappers' plan," said a North 24-Parganas officer.