CCTV footage of 4-yr-old's kidnapping at CST shows the accused walking with a limp, as he gets off a train, goes to the waiting area, and abducts the girl while her family sleeps nearby
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The police have released the CCTV footage from Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST) that shows a man kidnapping a four-year-old girl on June 10.
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The unidentified man is seen walking with a limp in the video, and is believed to be between 25 and 30 years of age.
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The incident happened when the child’s parents were asleep in the waiting area of the station around 2 am.
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The footage shows the man getting off a train, walking around the waiting area, spotting a sleeping family with a young girl, sitting beside the child and then disappearing with it.
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Kidnapping on film: (from top) The unidentified man gets off a train and then enters the waiting area. He sits down beside the sleeping girl and her family. After kidnapping the girl, he walks off and then finally steps out of the waiting hall with the girl
It takes less than five minutes for the kidnapper to leave with the girl since entering the waiting area.
The drama
On the night of June 9, Laxman Pawar (42) and his wife Pushpabai (35) decided to wait with their five children at Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus to catch the early morning Tapowan Express to return to their hometown.
They had arrived around 10 pm to catch their train, but it had already left. They decided to sleep in the waiting hall and catch another train at 6 am the next day.
As the family slept, the unidentified man kidnapped their youngest daughter Sangeeta.
Pushpabai got up around 5.30 am and realised that Sangeeta was missing. She woke up her husband and the couple started looking for the girl, finally approaching the Government Railway Police (GRP) at CST to lodge a missing complaint after a futile, two-hour search.
When the GRP also failed to find the girl, they decided to check the CCTV footage and found a man had picked up Sangeeta and walked away.
The police registered a case of kidnapping and have been looking for the man ever since.
Police appeal
Senior Police Inspector Surendranath Deshmukh of the CST railway police station said anyone who had any information on the limping kidnapper should approach the police.
“After missing their train, Laxman’s family slept in the waiting room instead of going back home as they decided to catch the train the next day. Between 2 am and 3 am a man aged 25-30 kidnapped Sangeeta while her parents were sleeping,” Deshmukh said. “The kidnapper looks handicapped as he was not walking properly and I request people to inform the police immediately if they have seen the man in the CCTV footage anywhere.”
He said copies of the CCTV footage along with the description of the girl had been sent to all railway and other police stations in the city, Thane and Navi Mumbai.
According to the railway police, the child’s parents were contract labourers who cleaned the railway tracks for daily wages. The Pawars had come to the city two months ago for a better life, but decided to return to their village after losing hope of achieving their aim.
Contact the cops
You may call the CST police station on 022-22620173 if you have any information on the man seen in the video.u00a0
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