Patna/Motihari: The residents of Rampur Khajuria village in East Champaran district are seething with anger following the murder of seven-year-old Prince Kumar, who was kidnapped for ransom on Monday evening.
The victim, son of medicine trader Raj Kishore Sah, was found dead in an under-construction building of a school under the jurisdiction of Dumariaghat police station on Tuesday evening.
Prince, a Class III student, was killed with a cricket bat by the alleged abductors and his body was stuffed in a gunny bag.
Tension was palpable at Rampur Khajuria village as a number of residents blocked state highway-74 and paralysed traffic for over four hours to protest the kidnapping and subsequent murder of the trader's son.
They demanded the immediate arrest of the criminals involved in the crime. The abductors had demanded Rs10 lakh as ransom for the safe release of the captive.
The extent of people's anger could be gauged from the fact that East Champaran superintendent of police Upendra Kumar Sharma was camping at the Dumariaghat police station since morning and keeping a close watch on the development in the case. The body of the deceased was handed over to the family after a post-mortem under the supervision of a medical team on Wednesday.
"I am unable to say anything. The world turned topsy-turvy in a few hours. It is hard to believe that my son is no more," said a shocked Raj Kishore. His relatives were more vocal. " Yeh kya ho raha hai purey rajya mein? Bachche, buddhe aur jawan sabhi mare ja rahe hain (What is happening in the state? Children, old ones and the young are being killed)."
On Wednesday, the SP said the police arrested three persons and seized the mobile phone, which was used for making the ransom call to the victim's family. The body of the kidnapped boy was recovered on the information given by the arrested persons, who were identified as Bachcha Giri (53), Chanchal Kumar (20) and a Class IX student whose name The Telegraph is withholding.
SP Sharma said the incident was pre-planned. The kidnappers had made attempts to kidnap Prince during Holi but in vain. On Monday, they kidnapped the boy when he had gone to play in a field adjacent to his house. The victim's family reported the incident the same night but lodged a complaint on Tuesday, he added.
When contacted, Chakia sub-divisional police officer (SDPO) Mudrika Prasad said one of the killers wrote his examination paper at a school on March 13.
According to police, while two are residents of Dumariyaghat, the other kidnapper belonged to a village falling under Naviganj police station of Siwan district. On the basis of tower location, the police picked up Chanchal first on Tuesday late evening and later arrested his two other accomplices involved in the crime. Police recovered two mobiles and the SIM card used to put forward the ransom demand.
The SP said the investigation into the case would be completed at the earliest and case would be put on a speedy trial.
