New Delhi: The Special Task Force (STF) of UP Police and the Gautam Buddha Nagar Police on Sunday claimed to have arrested the prime accused in the Anant kidnapping case from Noida.
Chattarpal is a resident of New Ashok Nagar in East Delhi. Chattarpal's accomplice Vijay Chauhan has also been held by police. Police had earlier arrested another accused, Jitender alias Bablu, in connection with the kidnap.
Anant, the three-year-old son of Adobe India CEO Naresh Gupta, was kidnapped last Monday from his Sector-15 A home in Noida. He was returned by his kidnappers on Friday under mysterious circumstances.
Explaining why the case was handled in a secretive fashion, Gupta said, "There are reasons for not divulging the manner of Anant's return as the case is still on." He added that he was in constant touch with the Police and they had been aware of everything.
Gautam Buddha Nagar SSP K S Rathore said Chhatrapal Singh alias Dev, who had hatched the conspiracy to kidnap the three-year-old boy, was arrested from the 'Pushta Nallah' area of Sector 14 and 15 on Sunday afternoon.
Dr Rathore said the accused was an aspiring film actor and wanted to make it big in the Mumbai film industry with the ransom money. "He wanted to marry his long-time companion and settle down in Mumbai," the SSP added.
Police recovered the phone from which the ransom calls were made. Other accused in the case, Pawan, is still absconding. Dev is the younger sibling of Jitendra, who was arrested soon after Anant appeared at his house under mysterious circumstances. Dev, a school dropout, had also acted in a telefilm in Mumbai, Dr Rathore said.
"He had seen the movie 'Dhoom' and since then had been toying with the idea of committing the crime using a motorcycle," he said.
On November 7, he had stolen the motorcycle, which he used in the crime, from Delhi's New Ashok Nagar area, where he lived with his family.
After kidnapping Anant on November 13 from Noida, the accused with his accomplice had taken the child to Hardoi for one night, then moved him to Etanagar for a day and spent two days in Goverdhan in Mathura, police said.
During the ransom calls, Dev had instructed Naresh Gupta to deliver Rs 60 lakh in Gujarat's Surat district. "Anant's uncle Lalit Gupta had immediately left for Surat in an early morning train, but soon he got a call to drop the money at the Meerut station....," the police official said.
Both Jitendra and Chattarpal helped their father run a Mother Dairy booth in Sector 15A of Noida, opposite the Guptas' house. On Friday night, police had recovered Rs 50 lakh from a person arrested in connection with the kidnapping.
The money was found in Belana village of Kakod in Uttar Pradesh's Bulandshahar district after police interrogated Jitendra. After Anant returned home on Friday, his father Naresh Gupta told a press conference that a ransom demand of Rs 60 lakh had been made but he didn't pay the kidnappers.
"Police said they can catch these people. But I refused because these are amateur kidnappers and I was worried about my child's safety. There was a ransom was Rs 50 lakh," he said.
However, Anant's uncle Lalit Gupta told a private news channel that the family told the STF that they were paying Rs 50 lakh to the kidnappers and were confident that the authorities would recover the money later.
Police claimed that it took custody of Anant in Kakori and brought him home accompanied by a cop in an autorickshaw according to a 'strategy'.
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