Mumbai: Kidnapped 6-year-old found by Mahim cops 16 hours later

The child's mother with her daughter's clothes

A six-year-old girl living on a footpath near Mahim railway station and who was abducted in the wee hours of Wednesday was found after a 16-hour extensive search by the cops. A man in a red shirt was seen taking the girl away on his scooty around 5.57am, the police said. The cops managed to trace the scooty to Kirti College in Dadar. Around 5 to 6 teams of local police were on the case.

Late on Wednesday, the police received information that the girl was seen near Mahim Durgah. Preliminary medical investigation has not found any signs of assault on the girl. Cops are now looking for the man who had abducted her and the reason behind it.

Early on Wednesday, the girl's family had rushed to Mahim police station complaining that their daughter had been abducted. The family said that the mother had woken up around 5 am and gone to a public toilet 200 metres away. "During this time, the child, too, had woken up and was answering nature's call next to the footpath," the police said. A neighbour of the family said they spotted a man sitting at the bus stop across the road, staring at the girl.

"My father, who had woken up then, saw the man staring. He seemed either drunk or under the influence of drugs," the woman said. "My father shouted at him to buzz off. When he started walking away, my father, too, went to the toilet. When he returned, he saw the person taking the girl with him on a white scooty," she added.

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The police started checking CCTV footage and a sniffer dog squad, too, was roped in, which confirmed that the girl had been taken to the Sion-Mahim link road junction, but her scent vanished thereafter. While the search operation was on, Mahim cops received information that the girl was spotted near Mahim Dargah. They rushed to the spot and found her there. "The child is alright. A medical test was done," said DCP (zone 5) Vikram Deshmane. "She is with her parents now. We will speak to her, too, to get some inputs," another officer said.

5-year-old kidnapped, raped, killed in Feb

In February this year, a five-year-old girl living on a footpath was abducted, raped and murdered by a 23-year-old man. The Mahim cops had, however, managed to arrest the accused within 24 hours. After this incident, the police had organised a massive drive in which they had started making footpaths encroachment-free.

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