3, including constable, held for kidnapping former gold smuggler

Tirupur: The rural police arrested three people, including a police constable attached to the Coimbatore city police, for kidnapping a gold smuggler from Palladam on Friday.
Police identified the victim as S Maheswaran, 33, of Thiruvadanai in Ramanathapuram district. He had been working as a driver for J Bhagya, 60, of Ammapalayam near Thirumuruganpoondi in Tirupur city for the last one-and-a-half-month.On Friday, Bhagya, her younger daughter and granddaughter went to Therpatti near Dharapuram in Tirupur. Maheswaran drove the car. Bhagya’s daughter got down at Therpatti. When Bhagya and her granddaughter were returning to Ammapalayam, Maheswaran’s friend Azhagarsamy contacted him over phone and asked to come to Palladam. When the car reached Palladam, a seven-member gang in three cars stopped them and abducted Maheswaran.
District superintendent of police G Shashank Sai formed five special teams to nab the kidnappers. A team found one of the cars used for kidnapping at Keeranur in Dindigul district.
“The kidnappers had kept Maheswaran at a farmland in Dindigul with his friends S Veeramani, 28 and O Azhagar, 33, who were kidnapped by the gang on Wednesday. The trio managed to escape on Friday,” a police officer said.
“Maheswaran used to smuggle gold ingots from Sri Lanka for BJP leader Goodluck Rajendran of Ramanathapuram district. A year ago, he had to abandon 5kg gold ingots after he was pursued by men in khaki. Though he told Rajendran about the incident, the BJP leader did not believe him. When Yasser Arafat and Mohammed Rizwan of Ramanathapuram, who gave money to Rajendran to smuggle the ingots, demanded the contraband, Rajendran handed over Maheswaran to them. Maheswaran managed to escape from confinement two months ago and shifted to Tirupur city to work as a driver,” the officer added.
To get back the gold from Maheswaran, Arafat and Rizwan had brought constable Rajeswaran with them to kidnap him. Palladam police arrested Rizwan and Arafat on Saturday and seized a car used for kidnapping. Police also arrested Rajeswaran for assisting the kidnappers. The trio was remanded in judicial custody.