Two kidnappers awarded life sentences in Arunachal

A CORRESPONDENT

ITANAGAR: Suresh Chakma and Prem Chakma have been convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment by the Session Court, Khonsa under Section 341/364A of the Indian Penal Code and Section 25(1B)(a) of Arms Act for kidnapping one Kashyap Baruah in the year 2019.

Baruah is an employee working in the oil sector and was kidnapped by the criminals on the way back from work.

On Thursday, the sessions court also and ordered payment of fine for the offence of wrongful restraint with kidnapping for ransom and possessing illegal arms.

Besides the duo, the court has also convicted 11 other Chakma persons under Section 411 of Indian Penal Code and sentenced them to pay fines for their offence of receiving portions of ransom amount from the main accused persons, with the knowledge that it was dishonestly extorted by the main culprits.

On April 1, 2019 rigman Kashyap Baruah, an employee under ONGC (Udipta Energy and Equipment Private Limited) working in the oilfield at Balipathar, was coming back with driver Manik Gogoi by their official vehicle. On the way to the Gautompur area, the accused persons namely Prem Chakma, Bakksu Chakma and Rajkumar Chakma (since deceased) stopped their vehicle showing dummy guns like AK-47 and kidnapped Kashyap Baruah at gunpoint.

He was detained in a deep jungle for 29 days and an amount of Rs 3 crore was demanded from the company as ransom for the release of Kashyap Baruah. After a lot of negotiation, Rs 40 lakh was paid to the miscreants as ransom for the release of Kashyap Baruah.

Sub-Inspector Ramakant Yen of the Diyun Police Station conducted intensive investigation of the case and arrested 14 miscreants who were involved in the offence.

Out of the entire ransom amount, he managed to recover an amount of Rs 30,79,500, besides recovering a muzzle-loading gun and the dummy AK-47 rifle used by the miscreants during commission of the offence.

It may be mentioned that Prem Chakma and Bakksu Chakma were previously convicted in another case of similar nature, for kidnapping a tea garden employee for ransom.

While imposing life imprisonment upon them, Session Judge Kashyap stated that the convicts are habitual offenders and they do not deserve any leniency in punishment.

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