LUCKNOW: A 17-year-old boy staged his own "kidnapping" to cover up for the money he spent on a party for friends.
However, the plot got busted when police began the hunt for kidnappers and recovered the "victim" from his friend’s home in Uttar Pradesh's Barabanki on Tuesday.
The boy told the police that he had spent Rs 2,000, which his mother had given to buy groceries, on the party. Afraid of being scolded by parents if they found out where the money went, the boy planned his kidnapping to demand a ransom of Rs 50,000, police said.
Additional superintendent of police, Barabanki, Ashutosh Mishra, said the police control room received a call from a woman who claimed that her son had been kidnapped and a ransom of Rs 50,000 was demanded.
"We registered an FIR and formed two teams — one to monitor the area from where the ransom call was made and the other to track the boy’s movements over the past week," said the ASP.
According to the police, the boy’s mother had sent him to the market in Amaniganj on Monday to buy groceries.
"We checked the CCTVs but could not spot the boy in the market. Meanwhile, his mobile was put on surveillance and we managed to trace its location," said Mishra.
When police "rescued" him, he broke down and pleaded not to tell his parents, ASP said.
In the past too, the teenager had spent Rs 500 given to him to buy household items on friends but had lied to parents that he lost the money, police said.
"This time he had a larger sum of money, so he came up with the idea of staging his own kidnapping,” ASP said. The boy has flunked Class 10 and his father and elder brother are history-sheeters," police added.
