Sambalpur, Jan. 5: A kidnap-and-rescue drama that started last evening ended this morning with the return of the two abducted persons, reports our correspondent.

Police rescued one of the abducted duo, Pramod Patnaik, after his companion Bisheswar Ghose escaped from his captors and informed the cops. The two were abducted while they were returning from Samaleswari Temple around 8 last evening in a car and kept in an abandoned room, said superintendent of police S. Devdutt Singh.

The police arrested the three abductors and recovered part of the money and mobile phone they had snatched from the duo, residents of Hindol in Dhenkanal. They also seized a country-made revolver.

The abductors are understood to have demanded ransom from the families of the two men. Ghose?s family, while informing the police, arrived here with the money.