3-year-old boy abducted from Pune found in Punjab; childless couple arrested

Pune, Sep 17 (PTI) A three-year-old boy abducted from Ranjangaon industrial area in Pune district five days ago was rescued from Ludhiana in Punjab and reunited with his mother, while a childless couple was arrested for the crime, police said on Wednesday.

According to police, a woman, Kajal Padghan, and her brother Pramod Patil were residing along with her three-year-old son in a residential building in the Ranjangaon MIDC area, where she also worked.

Padghan used to often drop her son at the home of a couple, Pooja Yadav and her husband Arjun, who lived in the same building, they said.

On September 12, she left her son in the care of Pooja Yadav as she had to step out for work.

"In the evening, when Kajal and her brother came home, they did not find her son and the couple at their residence. The mother grew suspicious and later discovered the couple had switched off their mobile phones. Kajal lodged a complaint at the Chakan MIDC police station on September 15, following which a case of abduction was registered against the couple," an official said.

Taking cognisance of the offence, Pune Rural Superintendent of Police Sandip Singh Gill formed a special team to trace the accused. Acting on intelligence inputs and technical surveillance, police tracked the couple to Ludhiana in Punjab, where they were found staying with the child.

A Pune police team rushed to Punjab, and with the help of their local counterparts, apprehended the accused, rescued the boy and reunited him with his family, said the official.

Police said since the Yadav couple was childless, they hatched a plan to kidnap the boy. PTI SPK RSY