Maha: Kidnapped Palghar toddler rescued from Bihar, security guard held

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Police has rescued a one-year-old girl who was kidnapped by a security guard from Palghar district in Maharashtra.

The girl was rescued, week after she was kidnapped, from Bihar and reunited with her parents on Wednesday, police said.

The accused identified as Sumendrakumar Sukaldas Mandal often played with the child and would regularly take her around in the neighbourhood. He went out with the kid on February 15 but did not return, prompting her parents to file a complaint with the Achole police, said the official.

The police tracked down the accused to his hometown in the Bhagalpur district of Bihar and rescued the child on Tuesday. She was reunited with her parents the next day, said the official.

The security guard has been arrested and the motive behind the kidnapping is being probed, he said.

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Earlier last month, Bandra police, after four months of investigation, detained a man for kidnapping a two-year-old girl from the Bandra skywalk on September 19. Police sources told mid-day that the accused lost both his legs in an accident and due to this he wanted a child who could take care of him in future. He was caught near Bhutan.

The accused was identified as Ashiq Ali Khan, 22, who begs on the Bandra Skywalk. The toddler's family told mid-day that a month before the kidnapping, the accused had started giving food and chocolates to them to win their trust. The police found a single video of Khan in the CCTV of Bandra railway station lift where he took the girl after kidnapping her.

Speaking to mid-day, the two-year-old's mother said, "We stay in a rented house at Vasai and sell toys in stalls on the road. But due to our financial condition we were forced to stay on the skywalk at Bandra after the lockdown. Khan also slept on the skywalk. He won our trust by offering food to us and giving chocolates to our two-year-old daughter. On September 19 we were on the skywalk when Khan took my daughter and told me that he will give her chocolates from a shop but didn't return. We searched for him but didn't find him."

"We immediately informed Bandra police but they didn't believe us. The officers accused us of selling our child. After a week the police started believing us. But now we are too happy that our daughter has been reunited with us. Sadly, she doesn't remember that I am her mother. The accused taught her in past four months that he is her father. I met her today but she didn't recognise me," she added.